Industry Watcher’s Digest

Buzzworthy developments of the past few days. 

• The time has come to pivot toward routine genomic analysis. The American Medical Association is talking to you, advancers of AI-aided precision medicine. In a post promoting the sixth module in its Ed Hub CME series, the group notes that, so far, genomic analysis has been performed only when evaluating specific cancers or rare genetic diseases. “Moving forward,” the authors state, “whole genome approaches will become a standard step in understanding, preventing, detecting and treating” all sorts of diseases. To learn more about how to learn more about AI and precision health from the AMA, click here. 
   
• Google is shaking things up at the top. In a blog aimed at employees but posted for the general public, Google/Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai says the moves reflect the company’s recognition of the present time as its “Gemini era.” Along with some rejiggering of departmental structures, the changes will see senior veep Prabhakar Raghavan “return to his computer science roots” to take on the role of chief technologist for Google. Meanwhile, Nick Fox, “a longtime Googler and member of Prabhakar’s leadership team,” will make the proverbial move upstairs to lead knowledge & information operations. This puts Fox in charge of the Big Tech biggie’s Search, Ads, Geo and Commerce products. Read the rest. 
   
• It’s also making Google Cloud’s healthcare AI goodies more widely available. This includes Vertex AI Search for Healthcare and some new features for Healthcare Data Engine. In both cases, the company says, Google Cloud customers will retain control over their data. Vertex AI Search for Healthcare is designed to lighten administrative loads for AI developers. Healthcare Data Engine helps organizations build interoperable data platforms—“the foundation of generative AI.” Announcement. 
   
• Investors have seen the future of healthcare AI investment, and it is multimodal. Which is to say that, soon, the most sought-after AI offerings will train on all manner of data—text, images, audio, video, wearable and what have you. So says Bessemer Venture Partners VP Morgan Cheatham. “While it’s understandable that healthcare executives aren’t yet championing multimodal AI, given its nascent status and still-developing applications, this technology deserves greater focus as research translates into products,” Cheatham tells MedCity News. “We’ve recently witnessed a similar transition with large language models, which have rapidly moved from research to widespread application.” Get the rest. 
   
• The U.S. really isn’t ready for the upset that’s headed at its workforce applecart. Generative AI is the mischief maker rubbing its hands together ahead of the hit. Or, as the Brookings Institution puts it in more genteel terms: “Existing generative AI technology already has the potential to significantly disrupt a wide range of jobs. We find that more than 30% of all workers could see at least 50% of their occupation’s tasks disrupted by generative AI.” What’s more, unlike previous automation technologies that primarily affected routine, blue-collar work, generative AI is “likely to disrupt a different array of ‘cognitive’ and ‘nonroutine’ tasks, especially in middle- to higher-paid professions.” Break out the worry stone and read the report. 
   
• Balancing Brookings is the Indeed Hiring Lab. Analysts there reviewed lots of data too. And their advice seems to be “Calm down.” “We were able to take all these skills, map them to over a million job postings that we had over the last year or so, and then evaluate: Could gen AI replace a human being in performing this particular job function?” Svenja Gudell, Indeed’s chief economist, tells CNBC. “When we did that, the result was actually quite striking because we found that there were really no skills—literally zero—that were very likely to be replaceable.” There are, however, some dark nuances and wrinkles in Indeed’s findings. One is that healthcare administrative and support jobs land among the top 5 lines of work with “the greatest share of skills that have the potential to be replaced by AI.” Read the whole thing. 
   
• Three European organizations have banded together to help AI developers translate the EU AI Act into technical specs. If that sounds geeky, so be it. Because it’s also an important step toward broad adoption of compliant GenAI models for healthcare providers across the continent. The three orgs are ETH Zurich, a public research university in Zurich, Switzerland; the Institute for Computer Science, Artificial Intelligence and Technology in Sofia, Bulgaria; and LatticeFlow AI, a software company also in Zurich. The trio’s framework offers an open-source resource for evaluating the regulatory readiness of large language models. ETH professor Martin Vechev says the offering “can also be extended to evaluate AI models against future regulatory acts beyond the EU AI Act, making it a valuable tool for organizations working across different jurisdictions.” Details and link to the eval framework.
   
• If you or someone you know could use an intro to AI—or a refresher—check this out. MIT Technology Review is offering a free, six-lesson mini-course. Signing up gets you one email a week for six weeks. Each dispatch presents a self-contained module, from “What is AI?” (week 1) to “How to talk about AI” (week 3) to “Does AI need tougher rules?” (week 6). Details plus signup link.
   
• Recent research in the news: 
   
  • University of Michigan: Most older adults don’t trust AI-generated health information—but many aren’t sure what to trust
     
  • Lehigh University: New research suggests: To get patients to accept medical AI, remind them of human biases
     
  • University of Utah: AI in healthcare: Promise and pitfalls
     
• Notable FDA Approvals:
   
  • iCardio.ai receives FDA 510(k) clearance for echocardiography AI
     
• Funding news of note:
   
  • Healthcare startup Suki raises $70M to build AI assistants for hospitals
     
  • Mindtech Global raises £4.4M ($5.7M+) to power the future of computer vision training
     
  • Elad Gil’s latest AI bet is in health
     
• From AIin.Healthcare’s news partners:
   
  • Health Imaging: AI model slashes cerebral aneurysm interpretation times
     
  • Radiology Business: Radiology Business: Hands-free, generative AI system reduces radiologists’ time spent creating reports
     
  • Cardiovascular Business: Medicare administrative contractors approve coverage of AI-enabled quantitative CT