EU outlines plans to promote more data-sharing to fuel innovation

The European Commission (EC) has put forward new measures to boost funding for AI and open up more data for re-use to make data-sharing easier within the digital single market. Publically available data, like data from public utilities, environmental data as well as research and health data will be made available for reuse under the EC's plans, in a bid to help startups and larger businesses across the EU use the data to develop innovative services. Using data in the public domain is essential to developing services based on new technologies, the EC believes, such as artificial intelligence (AI), which China, the US and other countries are investing heavily in - just today the UK announced a £1 billion public-private sector partnership investment in the technology. The Commission's vice-president for the digital single market, Andrus Ansip, highlighted the need for data to make the most of technological advances. "The digital single market is rapidly taking shape; but without data, we will not make the most of artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and other technological advances," he said.