SwissCognitive Guest Article: Ayman Dayekh – “AI Success in GCC Countries: A Framework for Digital Transformation”

The more DIGITAL a company is, the higher the likelihood that their digital transformation–embedded AI projects will succeed.

In the high-stakes arena of digital transformation, Artificial Intelligence (AI) stands as both a herald of innovation and a beacon of caution. The narrative of AI’s potential in driving business transformation is well-documented, yet the road is littered with tales of both remarkable achievements and cautionary tales of ambition meeting reality. The academic discourse around these outcomes has given rise to frameworks aimed at guiding successful AI integration, among which the DIGITAL framework emerges as a beacon for managerial action in the tumultuous seas of digital transformation (Brock & Wangenheim, 2019).

Understanding the DIGITAL Framework

At its core, the DIGITAL framework identifies seven critical areas for managerial action and implementation in AI-driven digital transformation projects:

• Data: The lifeblood of AI, where relevance, accuracy, and timeliness of data dictate the success of analytical problem-solving.
• Intelligence: extends beyond operational efficiency, encapsulating the strategic integration of AI into business models, backed by managerial and technical prowess.
• Grounded: Anchoring projects in reality, ensuring alignment with current business needs, and mapping out a clear implementation roadmap.
• Integral: Digitalizing core business processes and ensuring seamless integration of technology into the organizational fabric.
• Teaming: Identifying and collaborating with strategic partners to bolster the ecosystem and enhance the project’s success.
• Agility: Maintaining organizational flexibility to swiftly adapt to market changes and emerging challenges.
• Leadership: Cultivating a leadership mindset that embraces change, actively supports digital initiatives, and communicates progress effectively.

The GCC Context: A Tale of AI Ambition and Reality

The Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries[1], often celebrated for their bold strides in AI adoption, present a unique backdrop for the DIGITAL framework’s application. According to the 2023 Government AI Readiness Index, several GCC countries notably outperform global averages[2], signaling a regional commitment to embracing AI (Government AI Readiness Index, 2023). The first ministry of Artificial Intelligence (AI was established in October 2017 in United Arab Emirates (UAE). According to McKinsey research, Artificial intelligence (AI) has the potential to deliver real value in the Middle East’s Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries—as much as $150 billion (Berglind, Fadia, & Isherwood, 2022).

However, this enthusiasm is not immune to the pitfalls of digital transformation, as evidenced by high-profile AI project challenges. Real-life examples, such as the ambitious yet ultimately recalibrated AI initiatives in projects across the region, highlight the critical need for a structured approach to AI integration. These examples underscore the importance of not just ambition but strategic, well-grounded planning in leveraging AI’s potential.

Evolving the DIGITAL Framework for the GCC

Within the dynamic and diverse context of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries, both existing elements of the DIGITAL framework and additional considerations assume enhanced significance due to the unique cultural, economic, and technological landscapes of the region.

Let’s explore some of these elements:

1. Data sovereignty and localization are crucial in the GCC due to stringent data protection regulations and the emphasis on national security. Ensuring data is stored and processed within national borders aligns with regulatory requirements and builds trust in digital systems.
2. The integration of cultural intelligence into AI systems is vital to ensure that technology solutions are culturally appropriate and sensitive. This is particularly important in a region with deep cultural and religious roots, ensuring technology adoption is smooth and respectful of local norms.
3. Projects need to be grounded in the economic and social realities of the GCC, where there is a strong push towards diversification away from oil-dependency. This means AI and digital projects should support broader national visions, which focus on sustainable development, innovation, and knowledge-based economies.
4. Public-private partnerships (PPPs) gain enhanced significance in the GCC, where the government often plays a pivotal role in economic initiatives. Collaboration between the public and private sectors can accelerate the adoption of AI and digital transformation, leveraging the strengths of both to achieve national development goals.
5. Incorporating Islamic ethical considerations into AI development and deployment is significant for the GCC. Ensuring that AI applications comply with Islamic ethical standards can enhance societal acceptance and support.
6. The GCC is home to a diverse population, including a significant number of expatriates. AI and digital solutions must be designed to cater to a wide range of cultural backgrounds and languages, ensuring inclusivity and accessibility.
7. As AI and automation change job landscapes, focusing on education, reskilling, and upskilling programs becomes crucial. The GCC’s investment in education technology (EdTech) and vocational training can support a smooth transition for the workforce into the digital economy.

In summary, the unique context of the GCC not only amplifies certain aspects of the DIGITAL framework but also introduces additional considerations that are critical for the successful implementation of AI projects in the context of Digital Transformation. These adaptations reflect the region’s ambitions, cultural values, and socio-economic goals, ensuring that digital transformation efforts are both effective and aligned with the GCC’s vision for the future.

Conclusion: The Imperative for an Adapted Framework

The necessity of a tailored approach to AI integration in the GCC is highlighted by the region’s ambitious AI roadmap juxtaposed against the global backdrop of AI project outcomes. The disparity between the envisioned impact of AI projects and their actual realization calls for a structured framework that not only accommodates but thrives on the unique challenges and opportunities presented by the GCC market.

This discourse invites practitionairs, professionals, and scholars alike to engage in a critical evaluation of the DIGITAL framework’s applicability in the GCC. Through academic rigor and professional insights, this research aims to contribute a contextualized adaptation of the framework, ensuring that the GCC’s AI ambitions are met with success.

Participate in the Survey Now

Your experience, insights, and participation in this survey will not only enrich our understanding but also contribute to shaping a framework that is robust, adaptable, and reflective of the GCC’s unique digital landscape.

Participate in the Survey Now

Your expertise can help guide the future of AI integration in the GCC, ensuring that the region’s AI initiatives in the context of digital transformation are both ambitious and achievable.

References

Brock, J. K.-U., & Wangenheim, F. v. (2019). Demystifying AI: What Digital Transformation Leaders Can Teach You about Realistic Artificial Intelligence. California Management Review, 61(4), 110-134.

(2023). Government AI Readiness Index. Oxford Insights.

Berglind, N., Fadia, A., & Isherwood, T. (2022). The potential value of AI—and how governments could look to capture it. McKinsey.

[1] The Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf, also known as the Gulf Cooperation Council, is a regional, intergovernmental, political, and economic union comprising Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates.

[2] UAE (18), KSA (29), Qatar (34), Oman (50), Bahrain (56), Kuwait (69)

About the Author:

Ayman Dayekh is the founder and Managing Director of AZRE Consulting LLC and Board President of American Institute of Business & Technology (AIBT). With 20+ years of experience across multiple industries, he has experienced tremendous success, and gained some valuable skills and experiences along the way. Throughout those years, Ayman was accountable for delivering a wide portfolio of projects in government, real estate, freight management, education, healthcare, agriculture, manufacturing, and banking.

Der Beitrag AI Success in GCC Countries: A Framework for Digital Transformation erschien zuerst auf SwissCognitive | AI Ventures, Advisory & Research.

Author & Copyright: Virginie Martins de Nobrega, EMBA, Senior Adviser | Lawyer | Mediator | International Law, Human Rights, Public Policy & Ethics | AI 4 Good | UN SDGs

We have also seen that despite the discrepancies between countries from North to South, to Western countries to Eastern countries, there is a domino effect according to which major ethical issues and tendencies are almost simultaneously faced by every country at the same time, whatever their place in the AI race.

It was the case for the AI tracking applications and the facial recognition applications during #COVID-19, and it will probably continue because AI is questioning the equilibrium of geopolitics worldwide. It also questions our ability to face fundamental and crucial questions as of the future of multilateralism.

Below the translation of an article published in January, 2021 that highlights some trends I have foreseen in December 2020 for AI globally with some insights on the French market. 

Choosing people, multilateralism and innovation for everyone

Carrying out a prospective exercise is never easy and is even less so in the current context, which reminds us of the impermanence of all things and the need to adapt with agility, both individually and collectively, while keeping a long-term vision and without giving in to the call of falsely obvious and short-term choices.

If there is one area in which the year 2021 will probably be a strategically decisive moment for States, the international scene and democracy, it is that of artificial intelligence (AI).

The speed of technological change and the massive investments made by the Asian bloc and North America over the last ten years have been more or less mitigated by a repositioning of States on the five continents through strategies that strengthen their comparative advantage: the industrial approach and investment capacity in France, the centres of excellence and attraction of talent in Qatar, the “back-office” of applications using AI in India or the strengthening of the European Union’s ethical and normative approach.

A myriad of soft law instruments have also emerged that systematise internal processes by giving them an ethical framework. Most of them are based on recurring concepts: trust, transparency, combating cognitive bias or diversity, fairness and accountability. The only thing that changes is the meaning of these words in terms of the safeguards put in place and the effectiveness of the sanction mechanisms and/or countermeasures provided for in order to remedy potentially damaging effects.

Moreover, AI has led to some standardisation of terminology across all sectors at national, regional and international levels. This terminology is inspired by the objectives of sustainable development and is based on the principles and values of international conventions and protocols, particularly those of the post-war period. In addition, multi-stakeholder “public-private” initiatives have been put in place since 2005 at the UN level with the U.N. innovation principles, relayed since 2018 by similar governmental and international initiatives.

Despite this progress, strategic, political and legal questions and issues will remain crucial in 2021, including:

1.   Will the strengthening of France’s position in AI also be accompanied by the strengthening of the French model, where fundamental freedoms and human rights remain the cornerstone?

2.   Beyond internal governance rules and ethics, we must continue to introduce more regulatory frameworks at national, regional and international levels. In this perspective, we must continue to lay the foundations for a future international charter or convention for a humane and humanistic AI under the auspices of the United Nations, the legitimate role of which is recognised. This instrument would also make it possible to restate the values and principles of multilateralism while shaping it in light of the challenges of the Fourth Industrial Revolution. Indeed, although ethics can help to restore meaning through questioning, it can neither replace the law nor provide a sufficiently binding framework to support a virtuous cycle of innovation.

3.   We must systematise detailed risk and opportunity analyses for AI applications each time these applications are extended to other sectors, to avoid AI applications that have already been tested being automatically deployed in another sector where they are not justified. Specifically, the French Data Protection Authority pointed out this requirement in its opinion on facial recognition. This should become a general and systematic principle.

4.   We must strengthen public powers (where necessary), in particular through data sovereignty, and the role of intergovernmental actors to avoid a shift towards technocracy and the privatisation of certain public functions, with the consequent risks for institutional and democratic mechanisms. Not everything is a consumer good or service. Placing a social and corporate responsibility on companies that is almost equivalent to that of public entities is neither fair nor consistent with their corporate purpose. If AI accelerates the permeability of fields of competence, it also calls for greater clarity on the responsibilities and powers of everyone. In this sense, national public power and that of multilateralism must be further valorised, while avoiding being locked into the binary choice of the authoritarian state or technocracy. Both leave little room for diversity, multiculturalism and critical thinking. It is not the algorithm that must shape men, but it is rather men that must master its technology. Freedom cannot be traded in the data market.

5.   To do this, we must truly integrate a social and corporate approach. Currently, despite a hint in the Villani report and some government initiatives, such as “Tech For Good”, impact analyses and analyses on the social return on investment are almost non-existent. What is the social contract in the era of the Fourth Industrial Revolution? What is our project for society? It is easier to ask these questions beforehand than it will be to curb (if it will still be possible) the harmful effects of predictive analysis systems, for example. Only then can we speak of progress and not of technological advance.

6.   Putting an end to the constant dichotomy between international conventions and protocols related to political, economic and social rights and the pursuit of profit would be more innovative. They are intrinsically complementary. It is only by building more bridges between these two fields that the project of a humane and humanistic AI will be possible and that we will be innovative and creative.

We must think of AI as an opportunity to create more consistency between sectors, strengthen our democracies and give new weight to the international multilateral system. Think of AI as a Copernican revolution that puts the people back at the centre of everything, while respecting the environment.

In 2021, let us be truly innovative by daring to be human.

Originally published here.

Der Beitrag Geopolitics of AI – trends for 2021 ? erschien zuerst auf SwissCognitive | AI Ventures, Advisory & Research.