Finland launches its AuroraAI National Artificial Intelligence program. AuroraAI will be fully available in 2022. By Susan Fourtané July 09, 2020

The promise of Artificial Intelligence (AI) is no longer a concept taken from science fiction. Businesses around the world are taking advantage of AI and automation, moving the enterprise right at the center of digital business transformation.

KrattAI is the vision of how public services should digitally work in the age of Artificial Intelligence. By Susan Fourtané June 08, 2020

In Estonia, there are around 30 Artificial Intelligence (AI) solutions deployed in the Estonian public sector that were identified as active as of the beginning of June 2020. The Baltic nation aims to have at least 50 AI use cases by the end of 2020.

In May 2019, an expert group led by Ministry of Economic Affairs and Communications (MKM) and Government Office presented proposals on advancing the take-up of artificial intelligence (AI) in Estonia aka for Estonia’s national AI strategy. ​

This current strategy has been prepared based on these proposals, as a plan on how to implement the expert group’s recommendations. It was adopted at Cabinet meeting on 25 July 2019. ​

Unless you’re familiar with old Estonian mythology, it’s likely you don’t know what the word “Kratt” means. Created out of hay and miscellaneous household objects, a kratt was a magical creature who would come alive once a pact was made between its master and the devil. This then allowed the kratt’s master to order it to do whatever menial labour or even nefarious tasks were needed or desired.

Suve is already working on the webpages of Government of Estonia, Estonia’s Health Board, Ministry of Social Affairs, Work in Estonia, International House of Estonia and Invest in Estonia – with other sites soon to follow. During the emergency situation in Estonia, Suve focuses on questions related to the crisis situation. Her main goals are to find official information during the crisis situation, keep various emergency phone lines free for those in need of information that she cannot provide and help prevent the spread of fake news.

Around the globe, people are searching for innovative ideas to tackle problems created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Countries are scrambling to find solutions to combat the looming economic crisis, manage pressure on the medical system all the while trying to ensure that life can continue as normally as possible. Even the New York Times recently estimated that some countries might have a competitive edge in their way out the Covid-19 crisis. Estonia among them due to the digital society, startup ecosystem, and agile business and government partnerships.

Suve  is an automated chatbot, whose main task is to make sure that you and everyone living in or visiting Estonia get their questions answered from official sources. Suve has been integrated into several public websites. During the emergency situation related to COVID-19, she helps to provide accurate and trustworthy information in English, Estonian and Russian.

Implementation of the national AuroraAI programme The aim of the Aurora national artificial intelligence (AI) programme is to implement an operations model based on people’s needs, where artificial intelligence helps citizens and companies to utilise services in a timely and ethically sustainable manner. The activities of the relevant authorities will be organised in such a way that they support people’s life-events and companies’ business-related events, facilitating seamless, effective and smoothly functioning service paths consisting of the services of several service providers.