We need to talk about talents – AI talents. We lack them in companies (really?), but also in universities, and, "Now that Trump is in power in America, it is easy to poach them and bring them to Europe," according to some politicians. The idea is not far-fetched, but Trump bashing alone will not attract anyone to Europe. Europe first has to do its homework.

1. Is there data showing that talented people want to come to Europe?
London-based Zeki Research sees movement. In an interview with our editorial team, Thomas Hurd explains: "PhDs in particular are on the move and looking for new challenges, even if we don't pay as much in Europe. The data shows that talent is particularly interested in the UK and Germany. The full interview will be available on the Industrial AI podcast in the coming weeks.

2. Do we have the capacity to absorb AI talent?
I have little hope that German universities will. There is a lack of infrastructure, funding, offices, labs and much more. I am curious to see how we would cope if an AI heavyweight actually decided to teach in Germany in the future – including his team. The appointment process, which I was able to follow from afar, dragged on. Or will there be LexLeCun, for example? We can be curious.

3. Perhaps a first step would be to allow our good PhDs to stay in Europe, because our basic research is very good, and many talented people have gone to the U.S. in recent years because of the resources there, with which we can hardly compete. It is about jobs, infrastructure, laboratories, and career opportunities.

4. And the companies? When scrolling through the job listings of major automation companies, it is rare to find positions that would attract AI talent. One wonders: Is AI already “done”? The private sector would be most likely to absorb and benefit from the talent, but many SMEs are on short time, there is a hiring freeze or AI is not even on the agenda. "We’ll buy that,” is something you hear all the time. Interesting: A few days ago, the editorial team talked to young graduates from the University of Amsterdam about their career plans – well-educated PhDs. Many of them had the choice between large companies with compulsory attendance from Monday to Friday. For most of the graduates, this was an exclusion criterion. Caution: anecdotal evidence.

We have a chicken-and-egg problem, especially in research. Big names attract talent. But there are only a handful of big names left in Europe – Welling, Gharhamani, Hochreiter. Talented people then start companies, join companies, and develop or become big names themselves. Attracting big names requires resources – organizational, financial and technical. So where do we start – infrastructure, special professorships, or perhaps the companies need to get together and set up a fund? We should not leave it to the state.