• DIGITAL SME joins forces with partners to kick off a blueprint project ARISA, which will develop the European community for Artificial Intelligence skills.
• In the course of this four-year project, DIGITAL SME will contribute to creating a Pact for AI skills and support the uptake of new training and education opportunities. 
• Artificial Intelligence is on its way to becoming one of the disruptors of the European economy but there is a great need for upskilling and re-skilling.

DIGITAL SME continues to lead the way in creating a European AI community and has joined an EU-funded Blueprint project ARISA to support the implementation of the Pact for Skills by developing a sectoral skills strategy on Artificial Intelligence to help EU’s ambitious goals of Europe´s Digital Decade programme.

This project kicks off at a time, when, as according to the DIGITAL SME Secretary-General Sebastiano Toffaletti, “SMEs in Europe are often struggling to find staff that is adequately skilled to work with such technologies as AI. The recent Stanford Report on AI has also shown that 34% of all enteprises acknowledge the that gap in AI skills hinder AI adoption in their companies. This trend will only intensify as the need for the adoption of AI solutions has increased dramatically in the past decade. ARISA is a great opportunity for tackling this challenge by working together in creating a common sectoral skills strategy for AI skills and providing Europeans with tools to upskill.”

Europe is already lagging behind other big international players such as China and the US, when it comes to AI adoption and research, with China leading the number of AI publications and the United States still dominating the total private investment in AI according to the 2022 Stanford Report on AI. Another report by IBM published in 2022 also showed that the lack of skills and expertise in AI is seen as the top hindrance to successful AI adoption. Thus, this makes the access to up-skilling opportunities for Europeans a key factor in improving Europe’s position globally as a leader in trustworthy AI.

In ARISA, DIGITAL SME will build on its SME community within the Focus Group AI, as well as its networks and initiatives such as the recently launched Large-scale Partnership for Digital Skills, the Digital Skills and Jobs Platform and AI4Europe community in order to create the AI Pact for Skills. In addition, DIGITAL SME leads the work on long-term sustainability and contributes to the research on labour market needs. Our activities will involve DIGITAL SME members through our Working Group SKILLS and Focus Group AI to gain insights on how to ensure up- and re-skilling of employees and to provide the best possible curricula that address the needs of European ICT companies and their staff.

DIGITAL SME invites all our members to join our effort in building a wide and vibrant network of collaboration and finding ways how to become leaders in AI skills development!

Interested to join our experts in the Working and Focus Groups? Click here!

More news to follow soon.