How organizations are using data and AI to bring resilience and innovation to their operations
A few months ago, countries closed their borders, economies ground to a near standstill, employees became remote workers overnight, and everything we knew about doing business changed. Even today, we hear about “the new normal”, “the great reset”, and organizations are still required to demonstrate high agility to adapt in sudden changes in their market and region.
For many organizations, global crises have historically represented a watershed moment. Those that adapt and pivot are able to turn adversity into advantage, whereas those that don’t, risk failure. In this sense, COVID-19 is no different – accelerating several major business trends that were well underway before the outbreak began while forcing others to become obsolete.
One of these trends is the implementation of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to deliver operational efficiencies and support business model innovation and revenue generation while increasing our understanding of customers and markets. Investments are pouring into AI startups across various industries. According to the National Venture Capital Association, in 2019 AI-related firms in the United States had raised over $18.5 billion.
As organizations begin to emerge from crisis mode into rebuilding and reimagining businesses, there is a strong argument in place to prioritize data and AI initiatives – because, when scaled, research shows that they are highly valuable to organizations.
Let’s look at the data.
According to our report, which explores how to unlock the potential of AI at scale, almost four in five “AI-at-scale leaders” – enterprises that use AI across multiple teams and locations – saw more than a 25% increase in sales of traditional products and services since 2017.
For 62% of AI-at-scale leaders, customer complaints fell by at least a quarter, and 71% of AI-at-scale leaders reduced security threats by the same amount. Given the importance of tackling customer pain points and security issues since the pandemic began, it’s likely that these AI leaders will have accelerated even further ahead in recent months.
Our findings also show that 53% of organizations have now moved beyond AI pilots and proofs of concept, a marked increase from 36% in 2017. 78% of AI-at-scale leaders continue to progress on their AI initiatives at the same pace as before COVID-19, while another 21% have increased the pace of their deployment.
Those organizations, where Investment is progressing as before the pandemic, or even increasing, haven’t just succeeded in AI – they have seen it make a tangible difference to the top and bottom line.
