AI ecosystems; AI readiness; Digital transformation; Global South; Artificial intelligence ecosystem; Artificial intelligence readiness; Cambodia; Catching-up; Global south; Growing demand; Industrialisation; Innovative product; Senegal; Management Information Systems; Information Systems; Computer Networks and Communications; Marketing; Information Systems and Management; Library and Information Sciences; Artificial Intelligence
Abstract :
[en] The Global South (GS) refers to a block of countries in the process of rapidly catching up with the industrialization of their economies. GS countries are trying to leverage their growing demand for innovative products and services to negotiate the uptake of novel technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI). The latter can help such countries further stimulate their economic growth and become influential in dictating policies that could advance global development. However, a misaligned AI-adoption strategy entails the risk of alienating the social, economic, and even cultural requirements of such countries, ultimately leading to the incorporation of technologies not serving the needs of their users. Subsequently, we conduct a study whose goal is to provide guidelines on how to perform a comprehensive analysis of the AI ecosystems in GS countries, to determine their readiness to adopt and utilize beneficially these technologies. For this, we performed a qualitative case study of two GS countries, namely Senegal and Cambodia. The depiction of their AI ecosystems unveiled the need to stimulate their societies (i.e., by media exposure, education, etc.) in discerning the practical effects of AI. However, an impactful AI implementation requires a reciprocated satisfaction of the needs of multiple contributing actors. Finally, particular recommendations are offered at the level of these countries’ academic, industrial, and governmental constitutions, suggesting to focalize their resources in order to better energize (and optimally disperse) their research and entrepreneurial capabilities that could help identify the ways in which AI solutions can be of added-value within the premises of these two countries.
Disciplines :
Management information systems
Author, co-author :
Heng, Samedi ; Université de Liège - ULiège > HEC Liège : UER > UER Opérations : Digital Business
Tsilionis, Konstantinos; Faculty of Economics and Business, KU Leuven, Brussels, Belgium
Scharff, Christelle; Seidenberg School of CSIS, Pace University, New York, United States
Wautelet, Yves; Faculty of Economics and Business, KU Leuven, Brussels, Belgium
Language :
English
Title :
Understanding AI ecosystems in the Global South: The cases of Senegal and Cambodia
Interestingly, our interviewees have also placed a great importance on the role of NGO within these two countries when it comes to providing STEM awareness to society; this seems odd at first glance as we would have expected that goal to be maintained by Academia/Research Center. However, the interviewees emphasized on the dependency of the latter upon the (Senegalese/Cambodian) Government when it comes to the provision of funds making academia inhibited when it comes to determining their own educational curricula, and perhaps even the forthcoming focus-areas in research. This indirect reliance of academia on government is more intense in the case of Cambodia. This is easily visible in Fig. 2 where the Cambodian Academia/Research Center cannot access financial support from the Regional Organization (i.e., ASEAN); by contrast, the funding root of the Regional Organization is accessible to the Senegalese Academia/Research Center. This (phenomenally insignificant) missing link in the case of Cambodia has direct consequences in terms of the independence of the academic world and its role as a societal instigator/pedagogue.
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