Responsible AI is a competitive advantage

In the era of generative AI, the promise of the technology grows daily as organizations unlock its new possibilities. However, the true measure of AI's advancement goes beyond its technical capabilities.

It's about how technology is harnessed to reflect collective values and create a world where innovation benefits everyone, not just a privileged few. Prioritizing trust and safety while scaling artificial intelligence (AI) with governance is paramount to realizing the full benefits of this technology.

It is becoming clear that for many companies, the ability to use responsible AI as part of their business operations is key to remaining competitive. To do that, organizations need to develop an AI strategy that enables them to harness AI responsibly. That strategy should include:

• Establishing a framework for governing data and AI across the business.
• Integrating AI into workflows that offer the greatest business impact.
• Deriving a competitive advantage and differentiation.
• Attracting talent and customers.
• Building and retaining shareholder and investor confidence.

To help grow the opportunities that AI offers, organizations should consider adopting an open strategy. Open ecosystems foster greater AI innovation and collaboration. They require companies to compete based on how well they create and deploy AI technology, and they enable everyone to explore, test, study and deploy AI. This cultivates a broader and more diverse pool of perspectives that contribute to the development of responsible AI models.

The IBM AI Ethics Board highlights the opportunities for responsible AI

The IBM AI Ethics Board recognizes the opportunities presented by AI while also establishing safeguards to mitigate against misuse. A responsible AI strategy is at the core of this approach:

The board's white paper, "Foundation models: Opportunities, risks and mitigations," illustrates that foundation models show substantial improvements in their ability to tackle challenging and intricate problems. Underpinned by AI and data governance, the benefits of foundation models can be realized responsibly, including increased productivity (expanding the areas where AI can be used in an enterprise), completion of tasks requiring different data types (such as natural language, text, image and audio), and reduced expenses by applying a trained foundation model to a new task (versus training a new AI model for the task).

Foundation models are generative, providing opportunities for AI to automate routine and tedious tasks within operational workflows, freeing users to allocate more time to creative and innovative work. An interactive version of the foundation model white paper is also available through IBM watsonx™ AI risk atlas.

In recognition of the possible productivity gains offered by AI, the board's white paper on Augmenting Human Intelligence emphasizes that the effective integration of AI into existing work practices can enable AI-assisted workers to become more efficient and accurate, contributing to a company's competitive differentiation.

By handling routine tasks, AI can attract and retain talent by providing employees with opportunities to upskill into new and different career paths or to focuson more creative and complex tasks requiring critical thinking and subject matter expertise within their existing roles.

Earlier this year, the IBM AI Ethics Board highlighted that a human-centric approach to AI needs to advance AI's capabilities while adopting ethical practices and addressing sustainability needs. AI creation requires vast amounts of energy and data. In 2023, IBM reported that 70.6% of its total electricity consumption came from renewable sources, including 74% of the electricity consumed by IBM data centers, which are integral to training and deploying AI models.

IBM is also focused on developing energy-efficient methods to train, tune and run AI models. IBM® Granite™ models are smaller and more efficient than larger models and therefore can have a smaller impact on the environment. As IBM infuses AI across applications, we are committed to meeting shareholders', investors' and other stakeholders' growing expectations for the responsible use of AI, including the sustainable use of AI.

AI presents an exciting opportunity to address some of society's most pressing challenges. On this AI Appreciation Day, join the IBM AI Ethics Board in our commitment to the responsible development of this transformative technology.