The Government has appointed engineer and entrepreneur Ignasi Belda general director of the Spanish Agency for the Supervision of Artificial Intelligence (Aesia), the body in charge of ensuring compliance with the European Artificial Intelligence Regulation. The Executive’s intention is for Aesia to launch this summer, according to what the Minister of Digital Transformation and Public Service, José Luis Escrivá, told EL PAÍS, which would mean anticipating the obligation to have an AI control body. that marks the European regulations.
Belda until now managed the company he founded in 2019, MiWEndo Solutions, dedicated to the diagnosis of colorectal cancer, and is a professor in biomedicine and bioengineering at the International University of Catalonia. He has been general director of the Barcelona Science Park, a public institution dedicated to promoting innovation and research, where he successfully led a multidisciplinary team.
“Dr. Ignasi Belda is a highly qualified professional, with a solid academic background and technical experience in artificial intelligence,” said the Agency’s Governing Council, which has selected his profile from among 106 candidates. “Belda has extensive experience in research projects on artificial intelligence with tangible results and practical applications, especially in biomedicine,” maintains the Council, which also views favorably his experience in both the private and public sectors. .
Belda has a degree in computer engineering from the Ramon Llull University of Barcelona and a doctorate in Artificial Intelligence from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Bacelona and in Economic Law from the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya. He is also a PhD candidate in Modern History from the same center and has completed a BMA at the University of Cambridge. He also accumulates a number of quality academic publications on subjects such as the ethical challenges presented by AI, neural networks and mathematics.
Throughout her career she has received more than twenty national and international awards, including the 2014 Princess of Girona Award or the 2020 NAM Healthy Longevity Catalyst Awards granted by the American National Academy of Medicine.
Next steps
The general director of Aesia, Escrivá said, will have a lot of freedom to create the organization, located in A Coruña, from scratch. He will not only focus on supervision, advice, awareness and training tasks in artificial intelligence, but will also promote debates on ethics and security, driving innovation and technological development. In the coming weeks, the director will be in charge of the recruitment processes to complete the Agency’s personnel structure and advance the operationalization of its activities.
The council of experts that has chosen Belda is made up of Claudio Feijóo, professor at the Polytechnic University of Madrid and director of the Technological Innovation Support Center; the philosopher Daniel Innerarity, director of the Globernance Institute in San Sebastián; computer scientist Núria Oliver, co-founder and director of the organization for the promotion of AI ELLIS Alicante; and Jordi Torres, professor of Supercomputer Architecture at the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (Barcelona).
You can follow The USA Print in Facebook and x or sign up here to receive our weekly newsletter.
Subscribe to continue reading
Read without limits
_
