From telecoms and financial services to manufacturing and energy, organisations in all industries are experimenting with artificial intelligence (AI) across numerous use cases, according to new research from MIT Technology Review Insights.
The global AI agenda: Promise, reality, and the future of data sharing, based on a survey of 1,004 senior executives in different sectors and regions of the world, found that 72% had begun deploying AI by 2018, and 87% by 2019. By the end of this year, 97% of the large companies surveyed will have deployed AI technology.
IT and telecoms businesses were the earliest adopters with 81% using AI by 2018 – just ahead of financial services firms (78%) and consumer goods and retail (75%).
The top uses for AI are quality control, customer care and cybersecurity. Some 60% of manufacturers and pharma companies are using AI to improve product quality and nearly half of retail and consumer firms (47%) are using it in customer care. Meanwhile, over 50% of energy firms are leveraging AI for monitoring and diagnostics, 58% of financial services providers for fraud detection and 52% of tech firms to strengthen cybersecurity.
The report also revealed considerable interest in data-sharing to boost the impact of AI.
In the report, George Bailey, managing director of the Digital Supply Chain Institute, gives the examples of sporting goods producers that could use data from companies that support fitness apps, and consumer durables producers using data on end-user preferences and characteristics from retailers.
Two-thirds (66%) of companies said they are willing to share data externally to help develop new AI-enabled efficiencies, products or value chains. Manufacturers, consumer goods firms, retailers and health sector organisations envision benefits to supply chain speed and visibility and reduced time to market of new products. And technology and financial services firms see gains to customer service, cybersecurity and fraud detection, among other uses.
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Tags: AI, artifical intelligence
