New Nordics AI brings innovation to the Nordic-Baltic AI cooperation

In the first article of this two-part series, Cecilia Leveaux, senior adviser at the Nordic Council of Ministers, takes us through the story of how the initiative came to be and where it is heading.

Why New Nordics AI

New Nordics AI (NNAI) grew out of a remarkable year of Nordic and Baltic commitment to responsible and collaborative AI. The initiative originates from a recommendation by the Nordic Ethical AI Expert Group in early 2024. Later that same year, the Nordic Baltic High Level Forum on AI Readiness in Copenhagen brought together high-level stakeholders, including ministers, who expressed strong support for strengthened Nordic-Baltic cooperation on AI.

During the Forum, a pilot project by Nordic Innovation was launched, setting the initiative in motion. Ultimately, NNAI was launched almost one year later, in October 2025.

“The catalyst was the fast-paced development in AI. We saw that no country or organization can build capacity to act alone. There was a demand from businesses, the public sector and academia for collaboration – and given the role of the Nordic Council of Ministers, we saw it as a straightforward step to support the initiative,” reflects Cecilia Leveaux.

NNAI membership currently includes the national AI associations in the Nordics, with the Baltic associations joining soon.

“Advances in AI should be at the benefit of society and not only at the benefit of businesses.”

Cecilia Leveaux

“We have AI ecosystems across both Nordic and Baltic countries – and they are quite different. Instead of inventing something completely new, our idea is to build on the existing ecosystems so both the national work and regional cooperation can be strengthened,” continues Leveaux.

In addition, although small, the Nordic and Baltic countries hold high engineering capabilities and are home to critical industries of regional relevance. Paired with shared values, their combined strength creates a unique vantage point for the region.

What makes the region unique?

The launch of this initiative has highlighted some common values held in the Nordic and Baltic countries alongside a number of rare cooperation possibilities.

“We often emphasize the strong democratic values, high levels of trust, highly digitalized societies, and the longstanding public-private cooperation. There is also the Nordic Council of Ministers, as an existing platform for collaboration, which is a competitive advantage compared to other regions,” says Leveaux.

Building on these strengths, the NNAI has started a mapping exercise to identify points of collaboration across various industrial sectors in the region, with data centers and energy being among the first areas to explore, together with data economy.

“The Nordic-Baltic region is recognized internationally for trusted and advanced AI – and we have moved forward on issues such as attracting talent, facilitating company scale-up and more harmonized laws.”

Cecilia Leveaux

There is also a joint initiative to coordinate and accelerate the development of language models for Nordic languages. In addition to these synergies, a strong uniting point is the “social contract” in these countries.

“There is the Nordic Model” Leveaux points out, “as a balanced tripartite collaboration between the government, the private sector and workers. This is immensely important in the world of AI – we want to see technology advancing but with humans in the centre. Advances in AI should be at the benefit of society and not only at the benefit of businesses. Ultimately, technology is less about the tools and more about what we do with them to form the society of the future.”

NNAI to support EU AI Act implementation

One of the key projects for NNAI is the AI Act Implementation Network, intended to help organizations across the region navigate EU AI Act implementation and compliance by offering support, tools, and best practices.

For the Nordic and Baltic regions, harmonization is key, and a desired outcome from the Network’s effort. Importantly, the Network hopes to be able to identify specific pain points for companies when it comes to the implementation of the EU AI Act – and open the membership to more entities than the founding AI associations.

“According to the AI Act, very soon everybody will need to set up regulatory sandboxes, and the Nordic Council of Ministers is supporting the mapping of how regulatory sandboxes are being set up across the Nordics – this is a separate initiative to the NNAI and another example of cooperation and synergy. In parallel, there is a whole group of SMEs who will never be in a regulatory sandbox but still need help in positioning themselves in the face of new regulation – NNAI’s work with the AI Act Implementation Network is therefore also benefiting these actors,” says Leveaux.

EU shifts and a look into the future

In the past year, the EU has moved forward with regulatory simplification, including a Digital Omnibus – and this is something that intersects with the work of NNAI. Ideally, the future will bring better cooperation possibilities and more clarity around the regulation of data.

“There is value in collaborating in the implementation of laws – and a big gap in this space. One of the initiatives that the Nordic Council of Ministers supports is the Nordic-Baltic Working Group on EU Regulation, which gathers those working with implementing digital files and beyond,” says Leveaux. 

While it is still new, the NNAI has big aspirations, with Leveaux seeing an optimistic scenario in the future.  

“The Nordic-Baltic region is recognized internationally for trusted and advanced AI – and we have moved forward on issues such as attracting talent, facilitating company scale-up and more harmonized laws,” she concludes.  

In the second part of this series, we will learn more about the operational aspect of NNAI, current events and activities, and expectations for the future.