A new survey of 1,420 global IT leaders by Rackspace has found two-thirds of them rank artificial intelligence and machine learning (AI/ML) as a high priority for their organisations, an increase of 15 percentage points as compared to 2021.
The study polled IT professionals across industries, including financial services, manufacturing, retail, hospitality, government, and healthcare to understand the dynamics of AI/ML uptake amid growing economic uncertainty.
Underscoring the spread of AI/ML across businesses of all sectors, almost a third of respondents say they only started to launch AI/ML projects within the past year.
In comparison, 17 per cent said began implementing AI/ML two years ago, 11 per cent three years ago, and just 11 per cent five years ago. Though most respondents said AI/ML is a high priority, only 41 per cent say they have realised substantial benefits. A third have seen modest benefits, and 26 per cent say it’s too early to tell. About 62 per cent of respondents said there was internal pushback to the degree of adoption of AI/ML within their organisations.
Rackspace Chief Technology Evangelist, Jeff DeVerter said: “The fact that almost a third of respondents began their AI/ML journey within the past year is striking and points to the fact that these technologies are seen as the key to driving efficiencies in uncertain economic times. At the same time, the research clarifies that many organisations are still struggling to understand or realise the technologies’ full benefits of AI/ML, and many face internal resistance to adoption. All of this traction doesn’t consider the meteoric pace of AI attention in recent weeks with the explosion of ChatGPT, which has given AI a front-row seat in every business planning meeting.”
More organisations are leveraging AI/ML to improve the speed and efficiency of existing processes, with 67 per cent of organisations saying it is an area of focus versus just half in 2022.
Rackspace Chief Architect, Data & AI Nirmal Ranganathan said: “We see customers use AI/ML to build intelligent search capabilities to improve employee efficiencies, reduce manual processes by adopting intelligent document processing and improve customer experience through customer engagement solutions. Innovation through AI/ML is fuelling the consumer space with the mainstream adoption of Generative AI technologies.”
The principal barriers to organisations’ ability to effectively draw actionable insights from AI/ML include the inability to collate, structure, and integrate data meaningfully and the need for more capabilities or talent to manage data effectively.
