Taipei: Two Taiwanese nonprofit organizations and one public university were among 49 entities announced to receive funding from Google.org to enhance their artificial intelligence capabilities.

According to Focus Taiwan, the three Taiwanese recipients under Google's AI Opportunity Fund: Asia-Pacific are the Frontier Foundation, One-Forty, and the National University of Tainan (NUTN). Tina Lin, head of Google's sales and business development operations in Taiwan, shared this information in a blog post. The Frontier Foundation is launching a program to boost AI literacy among underprivileged groups, while NUTN focuses on creating an AI education ecosystem in southern Taiwan. One-Forty is actively teaching AI-related skills to migrant workers in their native languages.

Lin emphasized the importance of equitable and inclusive AI-driven economic transformation, stating that all workers should have the necessary knowledge and tools to participate. She highlighted a report by the Asian Venture Philanthropy Network (AVPN), commissioned by Google.org, which revealed that while 58 percent of people in the Asia-Pacific region believe AI will positively transform industries, only 15 percent have received AI-related training.

AVPN played a crucial role in selecting the recipients of the funding. The fund aims to ensure that AI's potential benefits a wide range of groups, including solopreneurs in India, household migrant workers in Singapore, and mentally and physically disabled individuals in Japan and their caregivers. To further this mission, Google.org plans to inject an additional US$12 million into the existing US$15 million fund, enabling more workers, small businesses, and nonprofits to integrate AI into their daily operations.