As part of the European Union, Romania is taking action on the artificial intelligence subject along with all member states. It takes pride not only with its talented minds working in the IT field, but also with its relaxed fiscal policies adopted many years ago for supporting IT professionals to create and develop this industry in the country.

At the end of 2019, Romania will see its first national strategy on artificial intelligence, according to the announcement made by Alexandru Petrescu, the Minister of Communications and Information Society, at the meeting of the Ministerial Council 2019 of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris.

Meanwhile, in the spring of 2019, the Romanian unicorn UiPath became the most valuable startup of artificial intelligence in the world, and the number of companies developing AI is steadily increasing. Also, we can see a growing number of digital events happening in Romania with the aim to raise interest and find solutions to the problems that the stakeholders encounter. All these are good signs that can only make us hopeful.

The Romanian digital landscape still has steps to take until its maturity, but we are seeing an increasing interest for it. At an important digital event in Bucharest, the Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, through the voice of Cosmin Marinescu, his Presidential Adviser – Department of Economic and Social Policies, has sent a supportive message for the digital development of Romania. He said that ”in Romania, with 6% of GDP, the digital sector is an important driver of growth and innovation, including the cybersecurity area. Our companies and specialists are internationally recognized and, I dare to say, Romania has the potential to become a regional innovation hub.”

Even though there are voices claiming that AI will take over jobs from humans and will lead to professions being vanished, we believe that the humanity will find its way to tackle this potential issue, being able to use AI for its benefit and as a partner, not to its disadvantage. Of course, this will require a responsible attitude from us, which we encourage by drafting and implementing as soon as possible a coherent and viable legislation, together with strong educational policies.

We’ve seen interest for ethics and legal framework for AI at many levels, from OECD to European Union and EU members, from Beijing to US, like Illinois. We are nothing but happy to see that things are moving forward and we encourage the stakeholders to find their way in getting a common approach on this matter.

We will observe the evolution of AI regulation in Romania and the main international trends in this field, including the AI regulation at the European level. We will write here about the main legal issues on the matter, so stay close for more.