The Prime Minister is still basking in the warm glow of his successful trip to Washington and meetings at the White House.
In addition to securing supply-chain support for Australia’s critical minerals ambitions, Anthony Albanese has also apparently secured President Trump as his new best friend.
At least that’s what it looks like, with the Prime Minister given the prime real estate at an exclusive leaders dinner at the APEC conference in South Korea this week (by which I mean he was seated next to the President).
With the critical minerals deal done, it’s on to the next thing. There is a great Paul Sakkal story in the SMH/Age this week about Australia’s ambassador to the US Kevin Rudd talking up the prospects of signing a pact with the US on advanced technologies.
It is worth noting that on a White House fact sheet put out to coincide with the PM’s Oval Office meeting, the Trump administration outlined plans for a “bilateral Technology Prosperity Deal” to establish joint initiatives on quantum, AI and other critical technologies.
It does sound a lot like AUKUS Pillar 2 for civilians. But the fact that Mr Trump this week talked-up Australia’s global expertise not only in quantum but in artificial intelligence as well, can only mean – conclusively – that Donald Trump is indeed our Prime Minister’s BFF.
As always there was plenty of news this week on AI and the data centres that support it. Specifically, at the APEC conference, data centre discussions have turned to energy, with the publication of an APEC Business Advisory Council report ‘Powering the Digital Economy: The Data Centre Dilemma’.
Given the Australia’s aspirations as a green energy superpower, it might be a case of one country’s dilemma being another country’s opportunity.
We will find out more with the release later in the year of the National AI Capability Plan – but in the meantime Industry minister Tim Ayres has filled in some of the blanks on what he says will be a “more expansive” strategy than originally envisaged.
Also on AI, Attorney-General Michelle Rowland ruled out changes to Australian copyright laws that would enable tech firms to data mine and train AI. She seemed pretty unequivocal.
Very much worth reading on InnovationAus this week is a column from Rajesh Gopalakrishnan Nair on what it means for the Nobel Prize for Economics to have been awards to three eminent economists for work that describes the critical nature of long-term government investment in science and innovation to economic growth.
This sounds dry, but for decades the conventional wisdom of economists – including those at Australia’s Productivity Commission – held that these funding programs are wasteful. The Nobel Prize winners say different.
Elsewhere – Finance minister Katy Gallagher revealed some tech-mega deals could face a shake-up, while Microsoft looks like it is getting pinged by the ACCC for some alleged slipperiness in the way it communicated price changes to customers.
And then there’s OpenAI, which has completed its transition to a for-profit company structure (and outlining a pathway to a US$1 trillion valuation.
In the news:
Sorry, China: Albanese and Rudd work up new tech deal for Trump – SMH/Age [$]
Tim Ayres signals ‘more expansive’ national AI strategy – InnovationAus [Subscriber]
Albanese lands the hottest seat at APEC’s festival of Trump – AFR [$]
Govt weighs copyright reforms after AI training backlash – InnovationAus [Subscriber]
Nobel Prize for Innovation. What does that actually mean? – InnovationAus [Subscriber]
Tech mega-deals face shake-up as some fail to deliver value – InnovationAus [Subscriber]
Microsoft sued for hiding cheaper plans from 2.7m customers – InnovationAus
OpenAI becomes for-profit after reaching deal with Microsoft – InnovationAus
Chinese and Russian tech scrubbed from govt systems – InnovationAus
Why is Bill Gates tone policing on climate change – The Verge [$]
Do you know more? Contact James Riley via Email.