Roundtable Fall Meeting Addresses “The Business Case for Artificial Intelligence”
Over 100 members of the Oklahoma Business Roundtable were in attendance at the Fall Roundtable event held December 14th in Oklahoma City.
Keynote Speaker Hart Brown of Oklahoma City-based Future Point of View provided an overview of artificial intelligence (AI) and the latest trends affecting this growing industry segment.
Brown said the sector was “at an inflection point”. Quantum computing and artificial intelligence (AI) are both transformational technologies and AI needs quantum computing to achieve significant progress. He said computing power was the biggest challenge facing companies – with a year-long backlog in the production of AI related computer chips.
He suggested Oklahoma has good potential to attract AI related businesses, especially those who require IT infrastructure and power. He said 4% of all energy used by business and industry is now devoted to supporting data infrastructure. He suggested Oklahoma might be a good location for more data center development and the state should train more people as coders and create more jobs where employees are supervising the new technology.
He also cited the success AI has brought to Japan – helping increase FTE capacity by building a technology-based robotics manufacturing workforce.
The meeting included a presentation by Lt. Governor Matt Pinnell who provided an overview of the state’s marketing efforts, including recent advertising in the Dallas market designed to encourage relocation of workers to Oklahoma.
President Mark Funke provided an overview of major Roundtable activities including an effort to modernize and enhance the state’s economic development program working directly with the business community, state economic developers, the executive branch and Legislature.
The Roundtable will meet again on March 7th for an annual Executive Briefing in Oklahoma City.