Members of Canada’s tech community fear the country is slow to adopt artificial intelligence.
Catherine Fortin Lefaivre said at the MaRS Impact AI conference in Toronto that she has seen too many Canadian companies get “stuck” in implementing AI because they want to develop large-scale AI strategies.
The Canadian Chamber of Commerce’s vice president of strategic policy and global partnerships says these companies should start with small, manageable deployments of AI rather than never implementing the technology because they’re so focused on planning and proof-of-concept.
Tomi Poutanen, head of AI healthcare company Signal 1, says adoption can also be difficult due to regulatory requirements and funding.
While he has implemented his patient insights technology across several healthcare organizations, he says many hospitals spend all their money on staffing and patient outcomes, leaving little for AI.
Their experience is backed up by a study released last year by KPMG that shows 35 percent of Canadian companies surveyed have adopted AI. This lagged behind the US, where 72 percent of companies used the technology.
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