Manitoba Association of AI Professionals steps into sector spotlight

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This article was published 19/09/2024 (408 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Just as the internet and digital technology has transformed business and society, artificial intelligence promises to make it all even more efficient.

A group of Manitoba AI professionals have taken it upon themselves to try to ensure the province keeps pace as the latest transformative tech seeps into every nook and cranny of the workplace.

That motivation has led to the formation of the Manitoba Association of AI Professionals. And while it’s first public event won’t be held until the middle of next month, Harry Roy McLaughlin, founding chairman of MAAIP and senior vice-president AI at Intouch CX, said there’s already been an enthusiastic response.

“We’ve not done any public announcements, but we’re signing up several new members every day,” he said.

Because AI technology has so many potential applications and its presence in society provokes so many questions about its use, there was a sense practitioners and service providers would benefit from a meeting place, as it were, McLaughlin said.

“That’s where spark becomes fire.”

Loretta Kulchycki, senior vice-president AI and digital strategy at Canada Life, is part of MAAIP’s seven-person founding board.

“There is a lot of excitement around AI, a lot of potential to improve productivity and efficiency and streamline work, and there is a real hunger to learn from other organizations and others who have successfully implemented AI,” she said.

MAAIP does not have its own strategy fully formed yet, and will do its own outreach to see what members want from it, officials said.

McLaughlin laughed about the fact it has been lucky to have a group of high-functioning members on the first board, because “there’s lots of tasks that we didn’t realize in starting up a non-profit.”

Coincidental to the formation of MAAIP, earlier this month, the Premier’s Business and Jobs Council formed a subcommittee on AI, technology and jobs. On behalf of that subcommittee, the Department of Economic Development, Investment, Trade and Natural Resources is seeking feedback from the business community on current and future applications for AI.

However, it’s not as if awareness of the technology has only recently emerged in Manitoba.

EMILI (Enterprise Machine Intelligence & Learning Initiative) has been around since 2016, but its focus is primarily on the agriculture side.

Tech Manitoba, the council dedicated to growing and fostering the sector at large, produced its own AI road map in 2022, noting: “Now is the time to leverage the passion of stakeholders to build a coordinated approach for Manitoba and accelerate AI growth and innovation in our province.”

Kelly Fournel, CEO of Tech Manitoba, has been fighting for greater awareness in the province for some time — and not always to great success. She believes an organization like MAAIP comes at a pivotal moment.

“I feel more hopeful,” she said. “There are more voices that are trying to raise awareness of the opportunity that is unfolding around us. Now, when people ask what’s happening in the AI world and if there is a collective strategic effort to raise the profile of AI in Manitoba and if they can get involved, I can direct them to MAAIP.”

Manitoba has a bit of a reputation for sitting on the sidelines while new technology is introduced elsewhere. McLaughlin and Kulchycki said it was one of the reasons for starting MAAIP.

“We love Manitoba and we want to attract and build great companies here,” McLaughlin said. “So we’re thinking, let’s create an organization where all those people are in the same room together and having conversations and we can work together to make Manitoba a place where you want to start an AI company, where you want to bring in AI talent to.”

With so many new members signing up directly via the organization’s website — which features AI-generated articles about various deployments of the technology – McLaughlin said MAAIP may have to reconsider its current lack of membership fee.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca