In a Gartner survey, 44% of CEOs said they struggle to prove AI pays off. Most plan bigger technology budgets.
44% of CEOs struggle to demonstrate AI-driven financial returns, Gartner said.
In the same survey of 203 CEOs and senior executives, 75% plan to increase technology investment.
A second Gartner survey, of 2,002 CIOs, found only 13% say their enterprise has realised significant or transformational value from AI.
Gartner calls its top group vanguards: CIOs with better business outcomes and high CEO-perceived AI value. Companies with rules for when a pilot should not go to production are 2.3 times more likely to be vanguards. Those with rules for retiring low-value AI in production are 2.6 times more likely. Only 31% of CIOs have the first rule, and 17% the second.
In finance terms, those rules would live in the business case. One sets the result a pilot must reach before production money is released. The other sets the point at which a live system is retired. Gartner's Alicia Mullery said AI costs are "probabilistic and determined at run time".
Gartner says CIOs need business partners "willing and ready to walk away from low value investments". The releases do not say who should hold the right to stop.
Sources
Our file on Gartner
- 22 Oct
Microsoft added new controls for European cloud customers. A Gartner analyst said he "would not call this complete control."
- 22 Oct
Gartner predicted leading firms will make 80% of new apps disposable by 2030. SAP maintains its core ERP system until 2040.
- 14 Oct
Gartner said AI data centres need $8.5tn in sales by 2030. It sees $3.6tn.
- 24 Sept
Gartner raised its forecast for 2026 AI spending to 2.7 trillion dollars.
- 10 Sept
Gartner said vendors call AI agents employees for one reason. Headcount budgets are bigger.
Every story here is open to read. The ERP LEADERS brief goes one step further.
The day in enterprise software, in one email: the stories that matter, the failures with their figures, one case taken apart. Read a sample or sign up for the brief.
Welcome back. · Issue 01
