2024 got off to a very beautiful start with the IDA technologist team (Nicola Stokes, Tristan McCallum, Claire Dooley, Dr Chantelle McCann Kiernan and myself, along with two colleagues who moved on to new areas in IDA Lorcan Brennan and Simon Faulkner) receiving a "Passion for Achievement Award" for our work in supporting colleagues across IDA Ireland and clients in 2023. It was a great surprise and pleasure to have received this, especially as only having joined IDA in a little over a year.
Looking ahead into 2024, will be a very interesting year , a few of the items I will be keeping an eye on.
1. The EU AI act taking shape and regulation for many in the software industry for the first time, what new opportunities, roles and challenges will this pose.
2. The growth of R&D investment in Gen AI with a focus on more tailored use cases across all sectors of industry, exciting opportunities for R&D collaboration in areas across sectors including EU Funding projects
3. Quantum software growing in interest , also Quantum linked with AI, what may this develop
4. Semi Conductor sector, what a year 2023 was, looking forward to 2024
5. The growth in Telecoms sector once again, emerging tech here
6. Ethical/Trustworthy/explainable AI , as AI gets embedded into Enterprise Solutions for the mainstream use.
7. Sustainability and how AI/Quantum can aid in this area
8. MedTech and AI, IOT devices, data at scale and how GEN AI and other approaches can help here.
9. Neuromorphic AI - This is an area of focus for me this year to learn more about it.
10. Hybrid biocomputer - Another area of learning this year, recent paper in nature on laboratory-grown human brain tissue with conventional electronic circuits — that can complete tasks such as voice recognition.
Look forward to working with everyone on these and other areas of R&D/Innovation in 2024. As always, feel free to reach out if you think I can help in anyway, always open to support where I can.
