Review of national policy initiatives in support of digital and AI-driven innovation

What can we learn from new policies implemented in different OECD countries to foster digital and AI-driven innovation? This document reviews and extracts lessons from 12 national policy initiatives (four AI strategies and eight policy programmes) aimed at supporting breakthrough digital and AI-driven innovation and the application of those innovations by industry. Most selected policy initiatives actively involve multiple stakeholders from public research, industry and government, have mixed public-private funding models and seek international co-operation on AI. AI and digital research and innovation centres encourage interdisciplinarity, reduce hierarchies within centres and increase the autonomy of staff to enhance centres’ agility and spur creativity. AI strategies set specific actions to strengthen AI research and capabilities, support business adoption of AI and develop standards for the ethical use of AI. Responsible data-access and sharing regulations, infrastructure investments, and measures to ensure that AI contributes to sustainable and inclusive growth are other priorities.