Huawei projects digital economy to reach $23 trillion by 2025

ARTIFICIAL intelligence (AI) could almost double the value of the digital economy to US$23 trillion by 2025 but a scarcity in talent worldwide might hamper this growth.

This is according to research by Huawei, which projects the value of the digital economy could increase almost two-fold from the $12,9 trillion in 2017 when it accounted for 17,1 percent of the global gross domestic product (GDP).

Huawei has disclosed the forecast in its Global Connectivity Index (GCI) 2018, now in its fifth year.

The index established that industries are embedding AI in key enabling technologies- Broadband, Data Centres, Cloud, Big Data and Internet of Things- to turn connectivity into Intelligent Connectivity, unleashing innovation to propel a new wave of economic growth.

Today, the digital economy is driven by the consumer-driven internet.

Increasingly, industries are leveraging Intelligent Connectivity to create whole new business models, products, processes and services that will breathe new life into the GCI S-curve and open a new cycle of economic growth.

GCI 2018 also discovered that to effectively deploy AI on a large scale, countries need three equally important components in place, namely computing power, labeled data and algorithms.

Kevin Zhang, President of Huawei Corporate Marketing, said the world is witnessing a paradigm shift initiated by AI.

“According to the GCI study, advanced economies that saw growth from ICT development plateau are using Intelligent Connectivity to open new opportunities, while some developing economies are also finding ways to tap the new technology to speed up their own strategic growth plans.”

However, the big challenge for all three GCI clusters is scarcity of AI developer talent hence the need by governments to re-think education for a future workplace redefined by AI and start building a healthy, collaborative and open AI ecosystem to attract and retain competitive AI talent.

This year, the GCI broadened its research scope from 50 to 79 nations, marking the second time it has enlarged its purview since 2015.