AI

GenAI investment top priority for nearly half of businesses

Photo: Adobe Stock

April 16, 2024

Investing in generative AI is a top priority for 45% of business leaders, and 97% of leaders at companies with more than an annual revenue of $1 billion or more plan to spend on GenAI in the next 12 months.

Those are top findings from a KPMG survey of 220 U.S.-based C-suite leaders.

Of the 97%, 43% report their organizations plan to invest $100 million or more, according to a press release on the findings.

Additional findings include:

• 51% of leaders are currently measuring GenAI-related ROI through productivity gains, followed by employee satisfaction (48%) and revenue generated (47%).
• Many organizations have provided or are planning to provide mandatory GenAI skills training for both employees (75%) and leaders (77%) in the next 12 months.
• 54% of leaders expect new business models to support their growth strategies in the next 12 months, followed by new product and revenue streams (46%), productivity (39%) and profitability (31%).
• 50% of leaders anticipate the greatest value creation from GenAI investments will come from enhancing existing products and services by analyzing customer data, enhancing efficiency to generate greater productivity (48%), improving product quality, efficiency and innovation (42%) and improving supply chain efficiency and reducing cost (37%).
• 90% of leaders feel productivity gains generated by GenAI are somewhat likely to extremely likely to reduce employee stress and burnout.
• Organizations plan to provide mandatory GenAI skills training for both employees and leaders (58%); another 17% of leaders and 19% of employees have done so already.
• 34% of leaders say the CEO is leading AI-related initiatives at their organization, followed by the Chief Information Officer (31%) and Chief Innovation Officer (21%).

"We're entering the next phase of GenAI, moving from pilots to transformational programs," Steve Chase, KPMG's vice chair of AI and digital innovation, said in the release. "Early experimentation has proven the potential of GenAI, sparking a readiness for greater investments that will deliver enterprise-wide productivity gains, reshape business models and create new revenue streams."