In 2023, generative AI gained widespread attention, fueling a surge in investment expected to grow exponentially. Projections indicate that generative AI is expected to account for 12% of total AI investment by 2027, a significant increase from the current less than 1%.While initial investment has been primarily from the private sector, there is recognition of generative AI's potential benefits for the public sector, offering improved services through the modernisation of processes and enhanced interfaces.Despite the critical role of public services, a cautious approach is necessary to ensure the safety and reliability of new technologies, especially in light of recent incidents like a generative recipe service producing toxic outcomes. As generative AI advances, a balanced approach is needed, urging public sector leaders to understand its capabilities and risks to harness its potential for service improvement.
A successful adoption of generative AI relies on a comprehensive governance strategy, emphasising the integration of Large Language Model Operations (LLMOps) during the transition of AI models to production. LLMOps, an extension of MLOps, encompasses practices, techniques, and tools crucial for the operational management of large language models, gaining significance as the public sector gradually scales up generative AI deployment.
Effective regulation of generative AI in the public sector demands a strategic approach that balances innovation and risk mitigation, requiring organisations to stay updated on the latest regulations for responsible use. Compliance involves adhering to ethical standards like transparency, accountability, privacy protection, bias avoidance, fairness, human control, harm minimisation, and prioritising individual and societal wellbeing and rights to foster public trust and maximise AI benefits for UK citizens while respecting boundaries.
To implement generative AI successfully, the public sector must safeguard itself and its citizens from potential risks while ensuring its workforce is proficient in prompt engineering — the art of creating effective input prompts for desired AI responses. Training programs from Google and Go Reply are available to help users acquire expertise and address this emerging skill gap.
Go Reply is a Google Cloud Premium Partner providing services in cloud strategy and migration, cloud hosting, data, AI/machine learning, and security, and is part of the wider Reply network.Google is a great AI partner for the public sector because of its maturity and pioneering role in GenAI, having laid the groundwork with the open source Transformers research, and its enterprise-ready generative AI offerings and ability to integrate these securely into its existing cloud services, which already lead the market for data and machine learning.
For the public sector, this leads to enhanced security and a guarantee that the service can be scaled as required.The widespread implementation of generative AI in the public sector is still in its early days, but getting proactive about exploring the possibilities today will be the key to reaping the benefits in the future.
Go Reply
Go Reply, a Reply group company, is the trusted partner for embracing digital transformation with the power of Google Cloud. Our specialisation translates into a wide range of cutting-edge services: cloud transformation - we guide companies in the digital era, successfully migrating workloads to the cloud; modernising applications - we optimise existing applications for better performance and greater agility; cloud data & AI - we harness the power of data and artificial intelligence to generate strategic insights; Machine Learning and Generative AI - we bring AI to the heart of business processes to improve efficiency and stimulate innovation. As Google Cloud's official Managed Service Provider, we have partnered with leading companies in various industries. This allows us to offer comprehensive and proactive support to accelerate digital transformation and business success.