Minderoo Foundation’s Frontier Technology Initiative

Overview

The Frontier Technology Initiative, established by the Minderoo Foundation, focuses on the societal implications of emerging technologies, particularly artificial intelligence and data-driven systems. It aims to promote laws, policies, collaborations, and institutions that effectively govern big tech, increase workers’ rights, and give the public a louder voice in the tech space. The initiative seeks to address the widespread violation of human rights associated with the unfettered use and abuse of personal information in the tech ecosystem. The initiative employs a combination of approaches, including policy, legal, regulatory, standards, technical architectures, community and capacity building, to demand accountability from industry and government, protect workers and the climate, and bolster public institutions. It engages with AI and technology governance experts across several continents, recruits leaders with international credentials, and prepares for a series of AI Eminent Thinkers forums in various global locations. The initiative also facilitates workshops and engages in research partnerships with major universities on topics such as AI and data governance, accountability, and cross-cultural dimensions of technology. Through its projects, the Frontier Technology Initiative aims to define the governance of AI and our data-saturated world, playing an active role in shaping the future of technology to ensure it benefits society as a whole. It emphasizes the need for a distinct opportunity to mark an inflection point on who wins and who loses, in the face of technology that threatens to have a dramatic amplifying impact on global inequality.

Investment Focus

• Focus on societal impact of new technologies
• Governance of big tech
• Protection of human rights in tech ecosystem
• Promotion of public voice in tech space
• Addressing human rights violations in tech