Karim Beguir received a TIME100 Impact Award in Dubai on Sunday, in recognition of his achievements in the field of artificial intelligence. He and his company “are helping accelerate progress towards an AI-first world that benefits us all,” said TIME editor-in-chief Sam Jacobs, who presented him with the award after a performance by AI artist & researcher Reeps100.
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00:00 Thank you. It's a great pleasure to be here with all of you. I want to thank
00:06 Time and the Museum of the Future. I'm incredibly honored by the Time 100
00:13 Impact Award. As I reflect on AI, I'd like to turn to the human side of things
00:20 and dedicate this prize to my parents and especially to my father, the late
00:27 Dr. Abdallah Begir. I'll also share with you a little story and a secret. The
00:36 story begins on planet Tatooine. Yes, the Sun planet from Star Wars. It's actually
00:43 a real city before the Sahara Desert in Tunisia, North Africa. And that's where
00:50 Dad, against all advice and after studying for medical studies in France,
00:56 decided that we should go. And so he could have chosen Paris or a nice
01:04 coastal city in the Mediterranean, but no, he focused where as a doctor he could
01:12 help patients most. And that's precisely what he did for four decades, leaving a
01:20 profound moral legacy. Dad never took the easy route. He always did the right
01:34 thing, even when it was hard. Especially when it was hard. He aimed high and had
01:43 big dreams for me. His belief helped drive me to France's
01:48 finest engineering school and later to study advanced mathematics in the US and
01:54 get a job there. He also had the entrepreneurial bug which he passed on.
02:00 This might help explain why years later I dropped everything and a career in
02:07 Europe and in the US to come back to Tatooine. My father taught me through his
02:14 acts that human values must be at the core of any project. So yes, InstaDeep is
02:23 an AI company, but it is also an idea driven by human values. From the
02:30 beginning, my co-founder Zohra Slim and I, we focused on empowering young talents
02:38 in Africa and beyond, creating a path for them to be participating in the global
02:46 conversation around AI and deep tech innovation. And yes, it was hard. But last
02:53 year, InstaDeep made global headlines with the largest tech exit from Africa
03:00 and in AI outside the US. And now that the path is there, we hope that many
03:12 innovators in Africa and beyond will follow. AI is bigger than the Internet.
03:22 Advanced nations compete to master it, but it is an incredible potential also
03:29 for the developing world. With a smartphone, even without an Internet
03:36 connection, students in rural Zimbabwe can now access personalized and
03:42 life-changing education. And soon, doctors on the edge of the Sahara, doctors like
03:51 my dad, will be able to tap into AI medical systems with accurate knowledge
03:57 of millions of cases, helping drastically improve health care. I'll share with you
04:07 a secret from planet Tatooine, but please don't tell anyone. The force in Star Wars,
04:16 the power that can take the galaxy to a better or darker place, is AI. So together,
04:26 we must use it for good. Thank you very much.
04:32 Please welcome the CEO and founder of Abeni. Accompany the tutelage.