At Davos: Which BigTech throat to choke?
Alt hed: Regulators' turn to Move Fast and Break Things đ
So whatâs the over/under that Klaus Schwab âretiresâ this year? Because the 1% must be pissed, right? Its once-exclusive enclave of power, celebrity and ⊠um ⊠other indulgences is now overrun by judgmental activists, mouthy regulators, and women (especially this one) and children they must pretend to respect. Even worse: They must pretend they care about something other than their personal wealth!
I kid. đ
But the judgmental activists and mouthy regulators part is true.
So this year, hilarity ensued:
Huaweiâs founder tried hard to convince an audience that weâve got Chinaâs AI plan all wrong ⊠and that Huaweiâs R&D in AI is âweakâ, with âclear boundaries on applicationsâ.
After firing its entire C-suite and removing the cofounder of Deep Mind from his company, Googleâs CEO âboldlyâ supported a five-year moratorium on public use of face-recognition algorithms. (Microsoft loudly disagreed.) The EU has been mulling such a ban for a while. (Thought bubble: Google trails Amazon in the controversial technology by about ⊠five years?) ⊠The CEO also tried to repair some of the extensive damage from the companyâs repeated (and increasingly viewed as illegal) acquisition and misuse of patient data.
And with Republicans running Washington DC â and Facebookâs executive team â whatâs a Liberal COO to do? Apparently, don a Madonna mic in a very small space.
The stakes are high. Bloomberg got a draft of the EUâs imminent overall plan to regulate AI â it includes legally binding requirements for those creating algorithms for âhigh-risk sectorsâ including healthcare and transport. And there may be more to come.
Politico sums it up: 2020 is the year regulators are going to move fast and break things.
TODAY INâŠ
DEEP TECH:
This WSJ piece gauges the timeline to achieving mutually exclusive technology systems in the U.S. and China
And CBInsights is out with its annual funding total for AI startups across all industries. Diving into healthcare, the firm saw $4 billion across 367 deals, 17 mergers or acquisitions, and two IPOs
MEDIA & TELECOM:
EU industry chief: Strict security rules wonât delay 5G
HEALTHCARE TECH:
Big Tech wants to crush Epic (and Cerner), so this ditch of Google Cloud is no surprise
This hospital executive nails it: When VCs + Silicon Valley + Big Tech take over, the customer is investors, not patients ⊠See also: Big Tech really wants you to blame hospitals for Silicon Valleyâs misuse of your patient data
FINANCE:
Vodafone is the 8th company to quit Facebookâs Libra ambitions
PUBLIC POLICY:
U.S. Treasury secretary threatens all European countries with tariffs if they go through with planned âdigitalâ taxes ⊠Nevertheless: UK to push on with digital tax in face of US anger
Another patient-advocate group calls on lawmakers and government to uphold patient privacy protection and strengthen HIPAA