The second plenary of ARES 2026 brought together business leaders, legal experts, and technology practitioners to examine how artificial intelligence, digital connectivity, and geospatial innovation are reshaping competitiveness across Europe and its neighbouring economies.

Moderated by George Welton, Executive Director of AmCham Georgia, the panel drew perspectives from Bulgaria, Moldova, and across the EU – converging on a shared diagnosis: the region is building digital infrastructure faster than the regulatory, institutional, and organisational frameworks needed to unlock its full value.

Panelists

Emil Angelov – Glavbolgarstroy Holding

Yana Todorova – Kambourov & Partners

Miglena Kuzmanova – Esri Bulgaria

Laszlo Toth – GSMA

Alexandru Gozun – AmCham Moldova

Key Takeaways

• Europe is lagging on advanced connectivity – standalone 5G networks in particular – risking a widening gap with the US and parts of Asia.
• Traditional sectors like construction are already deploying AI to capture institutional knowledge and automate complex workflows.
• Fragmented EU regulation, underinvestment, and governance complexity remain the main structural obstacles to scaling AI adoption.
• Trustworthy regulation, regional cooperation, and integrated use of AI with geospatial systems are viewed as essential enablers of future growth.

Connectivity as the Foundation

Laszlo Toth, Head of Europe and CIS at the GSMA, opened with a stark framing: Europe’s capacity to innovate in AI is directly constrained by the quality of its digital infrastructure. Without best-in-class networks capable of handling growing traffic demands, the region’s ambitions in AI will run up against physical limits.

“Europe’s ability to innovate, particularly in the AI space, is entirely dependent on its digital capabilities and on best-in-class infrastructure to underpin growing traffic demands.”

AI in Traditional Industries

Emil Angelov of Glavbolgarstroy Holding offered a compelling case from the construction sector – one of the most document-intensive industries yet historically resistant to digital transformation. The holding is actively developing AI applications, from assistants for technical proposals to modules that extract structured data from field documents, with the ambition of building an organisation that learns systematically from its own accumulated experience.

“The future of construction will belong to companies that can turn their experience, data and project knowledge into intelligence. At Glavbolgarstroy, we see AI not as a replacement for engineering expertise, but as a way to strengthen it – enabling faster decisions, better control and more competitive delivery of complex infrastructure projects.”

Location Intelligence as a Competitive Edge

Miglena Kuzmanova of Esri Bulgaria made the case for geographic information systems as an underappreciated layer of the digital transformation stack. From optimizing 5G antenna placement to enabling smart urban planning and disaster response, GIS provides the spatial logic that anchors digital decisions in the physical world. Esri’s ArcGIS platform now integrates AI and GeoAI capabilities, enabling predictive spatial analysis at scale – a convergence point for digital twins, smart cities, and national infrastructure programs.

“Every digital transformation hits the physical world – and the moment it does, you need GIS. Whether you’re deploying 5G towers, making government services digital, or siting a billion-euro factory, the question is always the same: where? Which community will it serve? This is GIS.”

Regulation Racing to Keep up

Yana Todorova, IP and AI counsel at Kambourov & Partners, offered a sobering legal perspective: the region’s investment in AI infrastructure is outpacing the legal frameworks that determine whether that infrastructure becomes a defensible, monetizable asset – or a latent liability. She highlighted that AI literacy is now a binding EU legal obligation under the AI Act since February 2025, a fact most businesses in the region have not yet registered. While compliance deadlines have recently been extended following industry concerns about standards and costs, the direction of travel is settled.

“Across this region, we are building the infrastructure for the AI revolution faster than we’re building the legal clarity around it. The companies that will lead the next decade won’t just be the ones who adopted AI fastest – they’ll be the ones who built on solid legal ground.”

Institutions as the Connective Tissue

Alexandru Gozun of AmCham Moldova brought the discussion to a regional level, drawing on the Moldova AI Hub – a co-initiative of AmCham Moldova designed not as a coordination platform but as a practical learning environment where companies, public institutions, universities, development partners, and technology providers develop a shared language around AI adoption, governance, and competitiveness. Anchor partners include AWS, Oracle, IBM, and Palo Alto Networks.

Gozun’s broader insight was that AI ecosystems do not emerge from government programmes or single large investments – they are assembled institution by institution, through repeated, trust-building engagement. AmCham Moldova’s business climate index METRIX has tracked this dynamic directly: the Digital & AI competitiveness dimension weakened in early iterations and only partially recovered as actors gradually aligned.

“We are building fiber networks, engineering intelligence, location intelligence and legal frameworks for AI faster than we are building organizations capable of combining them. Connectivity enables, engineering scales, GIS optimizes and regulation protects. But none of them compounds without trusted institutions that help businesses ask better questions, experiment safely and connect with one another. That is the role we see for the Moldova AI Hub, with AmCham being in the co-driving seat.”