According to a study conducted by Cisco, in their inaugural AI readiness index, only 26% of organisations in India are fully equipped to implement and leverage Artificial Intelligence technologies. The index surveyed around 8000 global companies and was developed in response to accelerating AI adoption, impacting almost every business and daily life domain.  

The study said that only 26% of companies are Pacesetters- fully prepared; the research found that one-third of companies in India are regarded as Laggards-unprepared at 1% or followers-limited preparedness at 31%.  

As per the report, 75% of respondents in India are confident that they have a maximum of one year to establish an AI strategy before the organisation goes through a significant negative business impact. 95% of organisations already have well-defined AI strategies in their arsenal or are developing some, which is a positive sign, but it exhibits more opportunities.  

95% of businesses worldwide are aware that Artificial Intelligence will boost infrastructure workloads, but in India, 39% of organisations consider their infrastructure highly scalable. The same 39% of companies say they have very little or no scalability at all regarding the new AI challenges within the present IT infrastructures. In order to accommodate AI’s potential and power and computing demands, around 68% of companies will need further data centre-graphics processing units to support the existing and future AI workloads.  

When data acts as the backbone for AI operations, it also acts as the area where readiness is weakest, with a huge number of Laggards compared to other major components. 73% of all respondents expressed their opinion that there is some siloed or fragmented data in their firms, which poses a crucial challenge. The complication regarding the data integration that resides in several sources and making it available for AI implications can affect the efficiency of harnessing the entire potential of such applications.  

Boards and Leadership Teams are expected to adapt to the changes brought by AI, with 87% and 88%, respectively, exhibiting greater and moderate receptiveness to AI. Out of all the employees, 20% of organisations reported that employees are either reluctant to adopt AI or outright resistant. The need for nurturing AI skills shows a new-age digital divide. When 95% of respondents agreed that they have invested in upskilling the current employees, 16% implies a growing AI divide, sceptical about the availability of required talent.  

The lack of comprehensive AI policies for around 18% of organisations is a concern, and the area needs to be addressed as they consider and govern all elements, presenting a risk of eroding trust and confidence. Such elements involve data privacy, sovereignty, comprehension of global regulations, etc. Moreover, closely observing concepts like AI bias, transparency and fairness in data and algorithms. This new study emphasises that while AI adoption has been progressing slowly for decades, advancements like generative AI, along with public availability from last year, are attracting people’s attention to these technologies’ concerns, challenges and possibilities.