Charting a New Roadmap of Public-Private Partnership for Research and Innovation in the AI Era

AI represents technologies that bring about enormous opportunities but is also reshaping the landscape of research and innovation in fundamental ways. Industry is in a leading role in many aspects of AI research, thanks to many factors such as its significant investment in AI research, superb computing resources, the ability to attract top research talent, and its agility. In contrast, the traditional academic research model does not have the capacity to swiftly adopt AI and similar technologies that emerge at an unprecedented pace and are instantly available to many parts of the world. The federal government’s investment in AI research, which also supports a large part of academic research in AI, is also far behind the level of industry’s investment in AI. However, academic and industry research have been complementary and both are indispensable for the advancement of science and society. A balanced and vibrant research and innovation system is essential to advance fundamental research, address societal challenges, and allow the exploration of many ideas that fuel creativity and future innovation. We need a new partnership model so as to bring out the strengths of all sectors to fully leverage new technologies and achieve unprecedented research breakthroughs and societal benefits. 

With Microsoft funding support and collaboration, MIDAS is organizing a convening of leaders in academia, industry, and government in early 2025 in Washington, DC. This event will facilitate the understanding of the complementary strengths of academic, government and industry research to advance scientific research and innovation with AI, imagine research breakthroughs with public-private partnership, identify barriers in public-private partnership and explore strategies to address. 

Our goal is to develop a new roadmap of public-private partnership to advance diverse yet overlapping goals and priorities, enable effective information sharing, improve coordination in investment and talent development, and improve the oversight of the adoption of new technologies. We aim to develop a roadmap that will have profound implications for leaders across sectors. Our current focus is on AI, but our vision and visioning will benefit our thinking about other emerging technologies as well.

For more information, please contact Dr. Jing Liu, MIDAS Executive Director, ljing@umich.edu.