EU's executive asked to reply to questions about Siemens chairman’s role
The EU Ombudsman is investigating the European Commission’s appointment of Siemens chairman Jim Hagemann Snabe as special envoy for industrial AI, according to a letter published on Thursday.
Back in June, the Commission created the new position and immediately picked Snabe to occupy it. He has been tasked with delivering a report on how the EU can “maximise the transformative potential of AI” by March next year.
Snabe’s appointment immediately raised questions about potential conflicts of interest. Weeks earlier, German industrial giant Siemens was actively involved in lobbying to cut EU rules for AI during talks on the Commission’s Digital Omnibus package.
“It is hard to imagine a more obvious conflict of interest,” Bram Vranken, researcher at corporate transparency non-profit Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO), told Euractiv in June.
