AeronauticsAI in industry: keys to successful adoption
Beyond the buzzword: how artificial intelligence is truly transforming engineering
Artificial intelligence is everywhere. We hear about its potential, its hype, its promises on a daily basis. Yet here is the paradox: the more it spreads, the more questions it raises. But the real challenge remains: how does this technology actually translate into performance for my team, my company, or my factory? During our recent LinkedIn Live conference, we brought together Guillaume Bour, Director of Enterprise Activities for the EMEA region at Mistral AI, Frédéric Pascal, Professor at CentraleSupélec, Director of the DATAIA Institute & Vice-President of AI at Paris-Saclay University, Caroline Lair, Founder of The Good AI and Co-founder of Women in AI, and Gualtiero Bazzana, Executive Director and Chief Artificial Intelligence Officer (CAIO) at ALTEN to decode these issues. Here are the key insights.
Adoption: the real challenge
Training and common understanding
A survey conducted for the French Ministry of Education reveals a paradox: 90% of respondents claim to use ChatGPT, but only 60% say they use generative AI. This confusion illustrates the first obstacle.
‘The most important thing for adoption is that people have a common vocabulary, a common understanding of what AI is.’ – Frédéric Pascal
International studies confirm this: countries where AI is most adopted are those that have massively invested in training. Finland, a pioneer in AI training for its entire population, shows the way.
Integrate, not just deploy
The challenge is not building models but integrating them into the company’s ecosystem. Guillaume Bour from Mistral AI explains: ‘when it comes to bringing AI into industrial processes, it’s not just about models. It’s about having a complex engine, developing front ends, having enterprise capabilities… For instant access management, observability, models customisation. And this is way more complex than just operating models.’
The human dimension at the heart of transformation
AI is not a threat to employment: it will automate 20 to 30% of repetitive tasks, freeing up time for creative and strategic missions. The real challenge? Developing soft skills – empathy, creativity, emotional intelligence – which become essential in the face of analytical task automation.
Continuous training becomes essential throughout one’s career to remain relevant in a constantly evolving world.
ALTEN’s approach
ALTEN deploys a three-pronged strategy: internal AI productivity, client solution development (AI-to-Market), and governance. Their philosophy: AI as an assistant, not as a replacement. ‘We transformed the tool into an AI assistant, a copilot giving managers the ability to improve, select, and adjust what the AI proposes,’ explains Gualtiero Bazzana.
Ethics and Responsibility
Caroline Lair emphasized that digital transformation cannot take place without a deep reflection on the ethics of artificial intelligence. She identified several major challenges: fairness and inclusion, data security and confidentiality, as well as model reliability. She also highlighted the growing environmental impact of AI, noting that the energy consumption of data centers could soon reach that of Japan.
‘Developing responsible AI should not be a question. It should be a business standard.’ — Caroline Lair
‘At ALTEN, we place responsibility at the core of our AI strategy: every solution we develop must be useful, safe, and environmentally respectful,’ explained Gualtiero Bazzana. This approach illustrates ALTEN’s commitment to making industrial AI a controlled and sustainable driver of innovation, aligned with the group’s environmental and social commitments.
Mistakes to avoid
Leaders often make these mistakes during implementation:
- Forgetting the real needs of teams
- Imposing a top-down strategy
- Neglecting environmental impact
The ALTEN team testifies to an alternative approach with Gualtiero Bazzana’s testimony: ‘We didn’t go into a room to define a top-down strategy. We went into the company to discover what people wanted to do. We found brilliant things and deployed them at the company level.’
Three key messages to remember
Master AI to stay relevant
‘Don’t be afraid that AI will replace your job. Fear not mastering it instead.’ – Caroline Lair
Education is Key
‘Without education, there is no knowledge. Without knowledge, there is no trust. Without trust, there is no adoption. And without adoption, there is no impact.’ – Frédéric Pascal
The revolution is just beginning
‘AI is a real revolution that we must embark on. And we are only at the beginning.’ – Gualtiero Bazzana
The success of AI in business will depend not only on the power of algorithms, but on our collective ability to train, support, and trust teams to profoundly transform our ways of working.