The objective of the new Business Finland programme, AI Business, is to make Finland the best country in the world to develop and utilise artificial intelligence and platform economy and to build global ecosystems and test platforms to attract investment.
The AI Business program funds Finnish start-up, SME, midcap and large companies in all fields developing and utilising AI and platform economy in business. The programme also offers international networks and export services like matching selected companies with large global companies.
The four-year AI Business programme’s (2018-2022) budget is EUR 200 million, of which Business Finland covers approximately half. In addition EUR 60 million can be used e.g. to fund digital platforms, resulting in significant network effects.
Develop, test and invest in finland
"Finland has decades of experience in neural network and artificial intelligence research, for example, and plenty of start-ups working together with research organisations. It has been estimated that artificial intelligence and platform economy will contribute 30 per cent to Finland's GDP in 2030. Business Finland's job is to share the risk of radical innovation development and thereby open the doors to selling them on the global market. Artificial intelligence and platform economy are just the things we want Finland to become the best place in the world to study, develop, test and invest. These are concrete measures to continue the valuable work of the artificial intelligence team set up by Minister Lintilä," says Business Finland's Director General Pekka Soini.
AI Business also funds research especially in joint projects involving universities, research organisations and businesses.
Global growth field
Artificial intelligence is developing fast and it comes with limitless potential. Artificial intelligence can be used for customer service and as an invaluable source of information for diagnosis. One of the latest areas of application involves learning interfaces. When you can genuinely talk with digital services, the threshold for using them becomes much lower.
The majority of platform economy funding goes to the development of B2B platforms and business ecosystems that create them. Finland is in an excellent position, especially together with other EU countries, to create new significant platforms. Up till now the field of platform economy has been dominated by US and Chinese companies.
This release was first published on 5 February by Business Finland
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