Serbia’s national AI model to be completed before EXPO 2027

Serbia must refocus on building an AI-driven digital economy to become a creator of its own products in the coming years, and to position the Western Balkans as a hub for original regional products destined for the global market, stated Marko Cadez, President of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of Serbia (CCIS).

Cadez made these remarks during the panel “Building an AI Economy - Data, Infrastructure, and Competitiveness”, held as part of the second edition of the BELTALKS (Belgrade Economic Talks) conference in Belgrade.

He emphasized that building a digital economy required deep integration and embedding of artificial intelligence (AI) into the industrial processes of domestic manufacturing companies, given the importance of Serbia’s industrial tradition as the foundation of its domestic economy.

– A key indicator of progress will be the number of manufacturing companies utilizing AI in their processes. To me, this is one of the most important metrics for AI implementation and its subsequent impact on the economy as a whole, given that Serbia’s economy is rooted in industrial production – Cadez said, responding to a question about what was needed for Serbia to become a credible destination for investment in the ICT sector, for the continued growth of companies, and for the modernization of the economy.

According to him, another crucial condition for further developing the digital economy is continued investment in and construction of digital infrastructure, efforts that both the state and the private sector have pursued thus far. He added that further development of an AI-driven economy required strengthening the energy sector by combining renewable energy sources with nuclear energy.

Cadez stated that Serbia had been laying the groundwork for artificial intelligence development for a decade and announced that the national language model would be completed before the EXPO 2027 specialized exhibition in Belgrade. He noted that the Serbian LLM, along with base and reasoning models, was being developed in parallel across two clusters, one in collaboration with the European company Mistral, with the aim of providing domestic companies and state institutions with secure, personalized models tailored to the Serbian language and the specificities of the local administrative and legal systems.

He emphasized that future digital development had to focus on the needs of the economy by linking education, infrastructure, and the business sector, while also investing in computing capacity, data, and infrastructure such as the State Data Center in Kragujevac and supercomputers.

Speaker of the National Assembly Ana Brnabic stated that the primary prerequisite for developing and applying artificial intelligence in Serbia was the creation of a database through the development of e-government. The second prerequisite, she noted, was the development of knowledge and talent, while she identified infrastructure, specifically data centers and supercomputers, as the third. Thanks to this, she said, the ICT sector has become the fastest-growing sector of the Serbian economy, and she expects ICT service exports to exceed five billion euros by the end of the year.

Aleksandar Bogdanovic, CEO and President of the Executive Board of Yettel Bank, emphasized that there was no doubt that artificial intelligence was not a passing trend that would disappear. He added that colleagues from various markets were surprised by how far Serbia had advanced in digitalization and how well-organized its services were.

Stefan Andonovski, Minister of Digital Transformation of the Republic of North Macedonia, stated that while approximately 40% of companies in the country used AI tools, only five percent of small and medium-sized enterprises implemented genuine AI models. He warned that merely using chatbots without altering internal processes did not bring about a fundamental business transformation. According to him, companies that lag behind in adopting advanced AI technologies could face serious challenges when competing with large enterprises that are deploying true AI agents.

Privredna komora Srbije

Yettel Bank ad Beograd

Narodna skupština Republike Srbije

Mistral

Aleksandar Bogdanović

Ana Brnabić

Marko Čadež

Stefan Andonovski

BELTALKS

Belgrade Economic Talks

National AI model of Serbia

national AI language model