Barry O’Sullivan

EurAI President and vice-president of the EU HLEG on AI

Barry O’Sullivan holds the Chair in Constraint Programming at the School of Computer Science & IT at University College Cork in Ireland. He is the founding Director of both the Insight Centre for Data Analytics at UCC and Science Foundation Ireland’s Centre for Research Training in Artificial Intelligence, which has funding to support 120 PhD students. Professor O’Sullivan is a Fellow and current President of the European AI Association (2018-2020), and was recently elected to serve on the AAAI Executive Council (2020-2023). Professor O’Sullivan served as vice chair of the European Commission High-Level Expert Group on AI (2018-2020) and currently serves as a scientific expert at AI Watch, an initiative of the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre. His scientific work is in the fields of artificial intelligence, constraint programming, operations research, and parameterised complexity. He also works extensively in the area of public policy-making related to AI and serves as a Track II diplomat on AI-related topics with a number of international diplomacy organisations. Professor O’Sullivan has been involved in winning over €300m in funding, of which €50m has supported him and his centre at UCC. This year he will receive the IPEC-EATCS Nerode Prize for work on parameterised complexity that appeared in the Journal of the ACM.

EU Challenges Panel 1: Barry O’Sullivan

September 02 4:00 pm - 6:00 pm (CEST)

The 25 countries that signed the Declaration of Cooperation on Artificial Intelligence made the first step towards boosting AI technology and industrial capacity through access to public sector data. Also, there are plans to fund AI R&D activities. The main idea is to work towards a comprehensive and integrated European approach on AI to increase the EU’s competitiveness, attractiveness and excellence in R&D in AI, as well as, keep it within some  Ethical, Legal, Social, Economic and Cultural (ELSEC) limits.

After the COVID19 pandemic, there are significant changes in the horizon, as a possible reduction in the original funding strategy. How will it be possible to have a coordinated approach towards AI for good and for all? How to transform AI-based technologies in something that benefits people and society as a whole? In this panel, we like to discuss How to (1) boost tech capacity, (2) prepare for socio-economic changes and (3) ensure ELSEC framework.

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