On March 4, 2024, the national FAIR “cascade calls” were officially launched in Florence, at the Auditorium of the Innovation Center of the Fondazione Cassa di Risparmio. The initiative is aimed at large companies, SMEs, and startups interested in leveraging the expertise made available by FAIR (Future Artificial Intelligence Research) to develop applied AI projects.
Companies will be able to choose from ten research areas, ranging from green AI to so-called human-centered AI—AI designed around human needs to enhance capabilities and enable increasingly advanced services. The calls also cover key theoretical domains shaping the future of AI, including robustness, reliability, data quality, resilience to attacks, and adaptability across contexts.
The calls (managed by the ten FAIR spokes) will be published from the end of March throughout April, distributing a total of approximately €12 million to companies. The long-term goal is to strengthen the Italian AI ecosystem by connecting companies developing AI technologies with the 27 organizations forming the FAIR Extended Partnership—comprising 14 universities, 4 research institutions, 7 large companies, and over 100 additional stakeholders including businesses and public administrations that have endorsed the project.
“The Foundation was created to bring together research and industry within a shared project to define the Italian path to artificial intelligence,” commented Giuseppe De Pietro, President of the FAIR Foundation. “One of FAIR’s goals is to involve the entire national ecosystem in AI. Collaboration is essential, as this is a global challenge dominated by major tech players. The only way for our companies to remain competitive is to work closely with research institutions and public administrations. We must build large-scale projects together, attract new funding, and expand Italy’s influence in this field. The cascade calls represent the first step in opening up this collaboration, which FAIR is committed to continuing beyond the PNRR project.”
The launch event, organized in Florence in collaboration with the Tuscany Region and supported by Fondazione Sistema Toscana, was attended by Leonardo Marras (Regional Councillor for Productive Activities), Francesco De Santis (Vice President of Confindustria), Marco Vicentini (Vice President of CNA), and MUR official Fabrizio Cobis, as well as Maria Chiara Carrozza, President of the National Research Council (CNR), which led the FAIR project proposal.
Carrozza stated: “The launch of FAIR’s cascade calls represents an extraordinary opportunity for the many high-tech companies operating in Italy. It is a concrete step toward fostering new partnership models between research and industry and enabling collaborations to unlock innovation potential. In the long term, the challenge will be to maximize the impact of these programs by supporting tools and technologies that can positively affect productivity and society as a whole.”
Watch the full recording of the Florence event here:
Click here to download Marco Conti’s presentation, President of the FAIR Scientific Committee
Click here to download Marta Rapallini’s presentation, FAIR Program Manager
Click here to download the FAIR Spokes presentation