Dive Brief:
- Most businesses are expanding their AI portfolios as leaders try to capture the technology’s benefits, according to a Rackspace Technology report published this month. The cloud services provider tapped Coleman Parkes Research to survey more than 1,400 IT decision-makers across 10 industries.
- Businesses currently have an average of 21 AI projects in production, the survey found. By the end of this year, IT leaders expect the list to grow.
- Two-thirds of leaders surveyed anticipate a positive return on their AI investments within the next two years and 26% expect returns within three to five years. Customer experience, ROI and competitive advantage are the top three success metrics enterprises track.
Dive Insight:
Enterprises continue to hone their AI strategies as the technology evolves.
Project prioritization has become a key part of the process as business decision-makers struggle to identify scalable and executable generative AI use case ideas out of a field of options. Businesses are grappling with rising AI project failure rates and, in many cases, are unable to move projects past pilot phases.
Nearly 70% of IT leaders said challenges around the implementation and scalability of AI are persistent, according to the Rackspace report. Technology decision-makers are also finding it difficult to contend with data privacy regulations.
Generative AI isn’t the only flavor of AI currently hitting roadblocks within enterprises.
Despite an aggressive agentic AI push from vendors, most businesses have yet to move the technology into full production. Excluding companies at the forefront of AI adoption, around 2 in 5 businesses are still piloting AI agents, and nearly 30% are waiting to see how the market evolves, according to the Rackspace report.
