The Volkswagen Foundation is a German private non-profit organisation dedicated to promoting research and education in social sciences and humanities. With a capital of about €3 billion, it is the largest independent funder of basic research in Germany. It is not associated with the automotive manufacturer Volkswagen Group.
Since 2017, one of the focus areas of the Volkswagen Foundation is artificial intelligence (AI) and society. It supports projects identifying opportunities of AI and analysing risks and the connection of AI development with the ethical, moral, and normative consequences of its actions.
As a part of its AI and the Society of the Future Initiative, the Volkswagen Foundation provides funding for research projects in engineering sciences jointly with social sciences and/or humanities. Funded projects are expected to explore new perspectives and insights with a view to shaping the future of AI technology and society. In the past year, the Volkswagen Foundation funded projects such as Contextualizing Robot Behavior: Should Robots Become Human Again?, AI to the Rescue: Life-and-Death Decision-Making under Conflicting Criteria, and many more.
- Funds projects researching human-focused AI and its safety.