Oracle's founder also takes the stage: in the future, governments around the world will all need "National AI"

In the midst of the AI battleground, it's a back-and-forth between different players.

Following NVIDIA's CEO Huang Renxun's call for "national AI" in February, Larry Ellison, the founder of Oracle, has also set his sights on the "national AI" track.

During Oracle's recent earnings conference call, Ellison stated:

In the future, AI will not only benefit Fortune 500 companies, but even countries and state governments will benefit from AI. Currently, Oracle's cloud computing service platform (OCI) has started to help some government departments build AI administrative systems.

Why do Huang and Ellison both attach such importance to "national AI"?

Because there is a huge amount of money involved, and it can significantly enhance the company's strength and status.

As early as 2019, tech giants like Microsoft, Amazon, Oracle, and Google were competing for a massive $9 billion government cloud service contract from the U.S. Department of Defense. In the end, Microsoft Azure slightly outperformed its competitors, winning the bid. Unexpectedly, the defeated Amazon, along with Oracle and Google, formed an "Avengers Alliance" and collectively questioned the Department of Defense's decision, leading the Department to "change its mind" by the end of 2022 and split the contract among these four companies.

At that time, Oracle was not outstanding in the cloud service business. Compared to the top tier players like Amazon and Microsoft in cloud services, Oracle's strength was lacking. However, by securing the government contract, not only did its cloud service capabilities greatly improve, but its stock price also surged.

Therefore, Huang and Ellison's high-profile support for "national AI" is because they see the huge potential behind government contracts. After all, making money is not trivial.

So, what is "national AI" and what can it do?

According to Keith Strier, Vice President of Global AI Strategy at NVIDIA, the definition of "national AI" is:

National AI is actually a country's ability to build localized AI systems around its infrastructure, data systems, workforce, and business networks, and these localized AI systems can in turn contribute to national development.

For example, after training a speech AI model with samples, it can help certain countries protect and promote their local languages. With the help of AI, better predictions of weather changes and extreme events can be made, providing advice on planting, irrigation, and harvesting to optimize agricultural production and reduce losses. In terms of legal compliance, AI demonstrates remarkable efficiency.

For instance, Oracle, in collaboration with Microsoft and NVIDIA, used AI to help Albania progress towards joining the European Union. The first step was to use ChatGPT to study all of Albania's legal regulations and then provide adjustment suggestions to meet the legal requirements for EU accession.

You might think that legal compliance can be achieved with human effort, but Ellison tells you how quickly this can be done with AI:

"When Serbia wanted to join the EU, it took eight years to adjust the laws to meet EU standards. Now, with the help of generative AI, we estimate that we can resolve Albania's legal compliance issues related to EU accession in about 2 years." After witnessing the efficiency of AI, countries around the world are stepping up their efforts to create their own "national AI", with countries such as Japan, Canada, and France already starting to establish their own national AI.

The hidden data security issues behind AI

It can be said that since the rise of generative AI, industries ranging from language, agriculture to law have been disrupted, as if having the support of AI can tilt the balance of victory in one's favor. However, this has also raised concerns among people.

Simone Bohnenberger, Chief Product Officer of cloud service company Phrase, warned:

"When a country completely transfers critical information such as national defense, taxation, healthcare, etc., to the cloud and entrusts it to the next generation of AI for processing, the potential risks may outweigh the benefits."

Such concerns are not unfounded. As generative AI gradually spreads to the national level, the data security risks it entails cannot be ignored, especially the risks of data leakage involved when allowing tech giants to access a country's citizens' data.

This also serves as a reminder to governments around the world that while enjoying the accelerated digital transformation through the use of AI, risk management issues should not be overlooked