- López highlighted the irruption of the “Spanish industrial renaissance” within the “third digital way” mapped out by Europe.
The Minister for Digital Transformation and Public Service, Óscar López, defended on Wednesday that the “Spanish formula” before the new technological ecosystem “works because we finance, promote, modernize and govern the new technologies”. He did so during his speech at the Ministerial Meeting of the OECD Council in Paris, where the role of digital and emerging technologies, including Artificial Intelligence, in promoting innovation and renewing productive sectors has been discussed.
Before his OECD colleagues, López assured that Europe “has mapped out the third digital path, which invests, innovates, competes and protects” and that, on that path, “the Spanish industrial renaissance is breaking out”. In this regard, the minister recalled that Spain has the “most expansive GDP in the eurozone thanks to a new economy based on new technologies”.
Thus, he recalled that our country has two AI factories in the European Union and that it aspires to have one of the first gigantic factories in the continent; that the BSC of Barcelona is “the first quantum supercomputer with 100% European technology”; and that the ecosystem in which the IllaNostrum 5 is combined, the sectoral data spaces and the open source models such as ALIA, allows companies and researchers “to develop and test emerging technologies in competitive conditions”.
In addition, the minister explained that the government has made a bet “for an entrepreneurial state that participates in venture capital projects of disruptive companies such as Multiverse, Sateliot or Wooptix”. “Strategic companies in sectors such as sustainable AI, quantum, satellites or chips,” he added.
“Spain wants to position itself as the epicentre of a reliable and sustainable AI”, continued López, who recalled that the country “invests in innovation and regulatory security at the same time”, giving as an example the AI Sandbox, “the first in Europe” that “offers companies a safe and effective environment to adapt to the law”.
“When support is practical, funded and targeted, SMEs adopt technologies such as AI,” said the minister, who said the government’s goal is to “digitize the country from the bottom up.” As an example, López has referred to the Kit Digital program that, with an investment of more than 3 billion euros, has digitized almost one million businesses throughout Spain.
In his speech, the minister defended the need for AI governance and reviewed the measures promoted by the Executive in this direction, such as the leadership in promoting the European AI Regulation, where Spain managed to introduce the prohibition of systems that allow the development of deepfakes the launch of the UN Independent Scientific Panel; and the creation of the AI Supervisory Agency (AESIA).
López has also assured that “we have learned from the crises to reinvent ourselves economically and technologically” and that the will of the Government is “to make AI a sustainable technology by design”. For this reason, he recalled, measures have been promoted to require operators to optimize refrigeration and consumption, integrate renewable energies and report on their impact.