Wednesday 6 May 2026 at 6pm (UK time)
VIRTUAL CONVERSATION
AI: the risks and opportunities for the European economy?
With Ajit Jaokar, University of Oxford, moderated by Frank Nigriello. They will be joined by Cassie Newbold, Data & AI Analyst, Brabners and Rosie Djurovic, Head of AI at Brabners, who will offer their own insights to the conversation.
Introduction to the event
This panel will provide an annual stocktake on technological change, focusing on artificial intelligence's evolving impact on European economies and geopolitics.
Artificial Intelligence is being introduced at an accelerating pace into almost all aspects of modern life, promising profound benefits and significant changes. Ai is boosting productivity and innovation but also threatens profound worker displacement, with potentially disruptive political ramifications.
The session will explore how AI and robotics threaten to automate 25% to 54% of European jobs over the next decade whilst creating opportunities for 9 million new "green jobs" and demand for digital, analytical, and regulatory professionals.
Projections for the UK are uncomfortable, with forecasts of millions of jobs being lost by 2035. Firms in AI-exposed sectors have already cut professional employment by 4.5%, AI threatening cognitive work rather than manual labour. But how real are these forecasts when according to American labour market analysis, the AI revolution is not that rapid?
It will assess the intensifying AI race between the US and China, where Chinese models are achieving near parity on performance benchmarks whilst the US maintains advantages through market size and semiconductor access.
- One year on, has Europe made progress in competing with the US and China on AI, or is regulation still outrunning innovation?
- Are we beginning to see real workforce disruption from AI, or have the warnings been overstated?
- Can the recently published guidelines published by the Anthropic Institute provide a basis for rational discussion of where we need to focus our debate?
Speakers' bios
Ajit Jaokar is a dedicated leader and teacher in Artificial Intelligence (AI), with a strong background in AI for Cyber-Physical Systems, research, entrepreneurship, and academia. Currently, he serves as the Course Director for several AI programs at the University of Oxford and is a Visiting Fellow in Engineering Sciences at the University of Oxford. His work is rooted in the interdisciplinary aspects of AI, such as AI integration with Digital Twins and Cybersecurity.
His courses have also been delivered at prestigious institutions, including the London School of Economics (LSE), Universidad Politécnica de Madrid (UPM), and as part of The Future Society at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.
As an Advisory AI Engineer, Ajit specialises in developing innovative, early-stage AI prototypes for complex applications. His work focuses on leveraging interdisciplinary approaches to solve real-world challenges using AI technologies. Ajit has shared his expertise on technology and AI with several high-profile platforms, including the World Economic Forum, Capitol Hill/White House, and the European Parliament. He also consults at senior advisory levels to companies.
Frank Nigriello is a writer, editor, and management consultant with a strong background in working with both ‘blue chip’ companies and SMEs. He was until recently Director of Corporate Affairs for Unipart, the global manufacturing, logistics and consultancy group headquartered in Oxford, Chairman of Oxfordshire Business First and chair of the B4 business network.
In 2014, he was named as HRH The Prince of Wales’s Responsible Business Ambassador for the South East. He is a founder member of IN2030. Frank began his career as a journalist, first in New York then in the UK. He joined IBM UK and later joined Barclays PLC as its first Head of Organisational Communications. Frank has been chairman of Oxfordshire’s Economic Partnership and chaired the county’s Employment and Skills Board. He was Chair of the South East Advisory Board of Business in the Community and a member of the Oxford Strategic Partnership board.
Cassie Newbold, is a Data & AI Analyst at Brabners. Cassie has developed data, Power Platform and AI solutions across a multitude of sectors. She brings a practitioner's perspective on responsible AI adoption, shaped by hands-on implementation experience and independent work exploring the environmental cost of AI at scale. She is particularly focused on the gap between AI's commercial promise and the governance, trust, and ecological obligations that responsible deployment demands.
Rosie Djurovic is Head of AI at Brabners, a Top 100 law firm, where she leads AI strategy across the human, cultural and technical dimensions of AI transformation. With a technical background spanning Ed-Tech, product development and consulting, Rosie brings a hands-on approach to AI adoption grounded in both practice and research.
She is an AI Researcher with Erdos Research, focusing on AI literacy and reskilling, and writes about human-AI augmentation at djuroai.com - exploring what it really means to build and work alongside intelligent systems.
Rosie is passionate about responsible AI and tech for good and is particularly interested in projects that use AI to solve real problems for communities and the environment.