How private companies are navigating the promise of AI

How many times have you heard the word “AI” over the past year? Artificial intelligence (AI) is in use all around us, even if often “invisible” — from machine learning in our electric toothbrushes and fuzzy logic in our rice cookers to ChatGPT in our children’s college classrooms, while also being added to many elements of business transformation.

Within this environment, private business leaders are weighing their opportunities to use AI to drive efficiency. To help our clients navigate the challenges of AI adoption, the global EY organization is investing in AI as well, with nearly US$1.5b earmarked to embed AI into proprietary technologies and to secure acquisitions with complementary cloud and automation technologies.

What private company CEOs are saying about AI

This investment underlines the potential we see in AI, and it’s clear that private companies do as well. The most recent EY CEO Outlook Pulse survey reveals AI is their top priority, with 49% of private company CEOs placing it at the top of their agenda.

In contrast, only 37% of public company CEOs listed AI as their primary strategic concern. This priority of private companies is in line with earlier EY surveys that showed 88% had either already invested AI or planned to do so in the next 12 months.

Private company CEOs also shared that their hopes for the technologies under the AI umbrella, from machine learning and automation to GenAI, include creating efficiencies that improve performance, mitigating cyber and other risks, and unleashing innovation. These desires mirror what I’m seeing in a variety of industries as companies look for areas where they can add AI to projects that are already underway, and I am excited about the transformative opportunities AI could bring.

But the journey to AI adoption is not without its challenges. AI transformation is complex, the technologies are changing rapidly, securing how data is used both inside and outside the organization is challenging and the required investment can be substantial. Smaller private companies often have less access to capital than public companies, so they will need to prioritize how they allocate their spending. Specialty resources also may be at a premium and will need to be focused in a smart and agile way, perhaps by considering off-the-shelf tools rather than customized solutions as part of a broader AI strategy.

How private companies are making the most of AI

Despite the challenges, there are private companies and entrepreneurs that have made AI the center of the business.

In Chile, Matías Muchnick and Karim Pichara, the cofounders of NotCo, are using AI to reinvent our food system. Their machine learning algorithm — named Giuseppe — analyzes the molecular structures of animal-based products so their smell, texture and taste can be replicated using plant-based ingredients.

Finland’s Douglas Castro, the founder and CEO of Neural DSP Technologies, is helping musicians enhance their creativity and efficiency. The company’s sound-processing software and hardware employs AI and machine learning to lower the barrier of entry for amateurs in the music industry.

Two brothers in the United States, Edi and Etrit Demaj, with their venture KODE Labs, build advanced artificial intelligence and machine learning applications to improve the sustainability and reduce the carbon footprint of buildings.

And in New Zealand, James Corbett, Phil Thomson and Tom Batterbury — the cofounders of Auror — built the world’s first retail crime intelligence software platform to globally transform how retailers and police report, solve and reduce organized retail crimes and theft in stores.

These innovators are game-changers — elevating how we live, how we create, and how we protect ourselves and our assets. Each of them is also a part of our EY Entrepreneur Of The Year? ecosystem.

While these entrepreneurs are disrupting industries, private company CEOs know that AI has the potential to disrupt their businesses. In an earlier version of our survey, just over 7 out of 10 agreed that their organizations must act now on GenAI to avoid giving competitors a strategic advantage. Similarly, 75% shared that GenAI will challenge them to disrupt their business model to maintain competitive advantage — and I think they’re ready for the opportunity.

This is only the start of your AI journey

My confidence in how private company leaders will use AI to their advantage is based on another technological disruption I’ve faced. When I was a first-year staff auditor, we rolled out a new program called AI — “Audit Innovation”. It involved one of the most threatening technologies to come out of the personal computer revolution — Microsoft Excel. Before widespread adoption of spreadsheet software, early-career auditors spent their time footing financial statements — literally adding up numbers. Now there was less work to do, and the question became how could this newly ‘found’ time be best used. Does the found time result in a pure efficiency play or is it better invested to focus on strategic wellbeing for both the individual and the enterprise?

That experience is how I now view the many flavors of today’s AI. They are game-changing technologies that will require us to rethink many things — process by process, function by function, job by job. But I don’t see entire industries disappearing overnight.

So what can you do? Here are three tips to get started.

1.???? Look at how AI can fit into your current business goals. There are likely processes you’ve already undertaken that could benefit from automation, machine learning or some other form of AI. Finding those quick wins is an important aspect of AI transformation.

2.???? Develop a robust and agile AI strategy. Scaling those initial wins is a larger effort that requires aligning your strategy with your overall business goals. A robust strategy should consider data gathering and protection, investment needs and budgets, existing and custom developed AI tools as well as ethical and legal considerations. ?

3.???? Invest in training and workforce development. Your employees need to have a basic understanding of AI and how it applies to their work. And when it comes to hiring new talent, finding people with relevant AI knowledge can help guide your strategy and foster a culture of innovation.

Of course, these actions are only a starting point. The field of AI is constantly evolving, so keep learning and experimenting to better understand it and all the benefits it can offer to your business. Learn more at EY.ai .

For those of you wondering, I’ve used the power of EY’s own internal Large Language Model (LLM) EYQ to enhance this blog. The output most definitely needed refining and polishing, but it helped to get the process started and trigger my thoughts.

The views reflected in this article are the views of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the global EY organization or its member firms.