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Updated December 9, 2024: The number of individuals Microsoft has helped train and certify over the past year has been updated to 23 million and includes initiatives across Microsoft.
In 2024, generative artificial intelligence has become a key driver of business results in every industry. Already this new generation of artificial intelligence is having incredible influence in our world — yet companies and industries are only scratching the surface of what’s possible as they continue to develop new use cases in every role and function.
To help organizations on their AI transformation journey, Microsoft recently commissioned a new study through IDC, Artificial intelligence business opportunity. IDC’s findings show that when organizations truly commit and invest in AI, the potential return on investment (ROI) increases significantly.
According to IDC, the study’s findings reflect a turning point as artificial intelligence takes off across industries. As companies around the world go deeper with artificial intelligence, Microsoft customers continue to implement new innovative solutions and discover how tools like Copilot can change their daily work. In telecommunications, Lumen Technologies estimates that Copilot saves sellers an average of four hours per week, which equates to $50 million annually. In healthcare, Chi Mei Medical Center doctors now spend 15 minutes instead of an hour writing medical reports, and nurses can document patient information in less than five minutes. Pharmacists can now double the number of patients they see per day. AI models help in retail Coles predicts the flow of 20,000 stock units in 850 stores with remarkable accuracy, generating 1.6 billion predictions per day.
IDC’s Top 5 AI Trends for 2024
IDC’s findings are consistent with what Microsoft is seeing as we work with companies across industries to implement AI. We pointed out more than 200 of our best AI user stories show an example of how artificial intelligence is already having an impact today. Below is a look at the main trends we see in the IDC study and the impact of those trends on organizations working with artificial intelligence today.
#1 Improved productivity has become table stakes. Employee productivity is the #1 business outcome companies are trying to achieve with AI. The study shows that 92% of AI users surveyed are using AI for productivity, and 43% say productivity use cases have provided the highest ROI. While productivity is the main goal, near-term generative use cases for AI include customer engagement, benefit growth, cost management, and product or service innovation — and nearly half of the companies surveyed expect AI to have a high degree of impact in all of these areas over the next 24 month.
Customer snapshot:
At global marketing and advertising agency dentsu, employees are already saving 15 to 30 minutes a day using Copilot for tasks such as summarizing conversations, generating presentations and creating executive summaries.
“Copilot has transformed the way we deliver creative concepts to our clients, enabling real-time collaboration. Agility, security and uniqueness are key, but our goal is to lead this transformation across the company, from top to bottom.”
— Takuya Kodama, head of business strategy at dents
#2 Companies are gravitating towards more advanced artificial intelligence solutions. In the next 24 months, more companies expect to build custom AI solutions tailored directly to industry and business process needs, including custom copilots and AI agents. This shows an increasing maturity in AI fluency as companies realize the value of out-of-the-box use cases and expand to more advanced scenarios.
Customer snapshot:
Siemens developed Siemens Industrial Copilot, which eased the challenges caused by increasing complexity and labor shortages for dozens of customers in various industries.
“Fully appreciating the transformational potential of GenAI, it is important to remember that production does not have an ‘undo’ button. It takes diligence and effort to develop artificial intelligence to industrial quality. Siemens Industrial Copilot for Engineering significantly facilitates the work of our customers and solves the pressing challenges of skills shortages and the growing complexity of industrial automation. This AI-powered solution is a game-changer for our industry with more than 50 customers already using it to increase efficiency and address labor shortages.”
— Boris Scharinger, AI Strategist at Siemens Digital Industries
#3 Generative AI adoption and value is growing across industries. Although relatively new to the market, adoption of generative AI is expanding rapidly — 75% of respondents report an increase in current use versus 55% in 2023. The ROI of generative AI is highest in financial services, followed by media and telecommunications, mobility, retail and consumer packaged goods, energy, manufacturing, healthcare and education. Overall, generative AI is generating higher ROI across all industries.
Customer snapshot:
Providence has leveraged AI to expand and improve patient care, streamline processes and workflows, and improve caregiver efficiency.
“Whether we’re partnering with organizations at the forefront of this technology — like Microsoft — and building custom solutions through the Azure OpenAI service, we’re advancing clinical research to help cancer patients receive personalized and precise treatments faster, or ‘with the push of a button to ‘ and adopting established technologies such as Microsoft 365 Copilot or DAX Copilot, we have successfully remained at the forefront of this technological revolution. For example, physicians using DAX Copilot save an average of 5.33 minutes per visit, and 80% of physicians reported less cognitive load after using DAX Copilot.”
— Sarah Vaezy, executive vice president, chief strategy and digital officer at Providence
#4 AI leaders are seeing higher returns and accelerated innovation. While companies using generative AI generate an average ROI of $3.7, the top leaders using generative AI generate significantly higher returns, with an average ROI of $10.3. In addition to increased business value, leaders are also on an accelerated path to building and implementing new solutions — 29% of leaders implement AI in less than 3 months versus 6% of companies in the laggard category.
Customer snapshot:
Södra is an international forest industry group that processes forest products from 52,000 owners into renewable, climate-smart products for the international market. Every day, Södra collects and interprets climate impact data to make thousands of decisions for every part of the value chain.
“With innovative artificial intelligence technology from Microsoft, our business experts and data scientists were able to help us become more sustainable while significantly improving revenue.”
— Cristian Brolin, Chief Digital Officer at Södra
#5 Looking ahead: skills remain the biggest challenge. Thirty percent of respondents cited a lack of specialized AI skills at their company, with 26 percent saying they lack employees with the skills needed to learn and work with AI. This is consistent with findings from Microsoft and LinkedIn 2024 Work Trend Index Annual Reportwhich found that 55 percent of business leaders are concerned about whether they have enough qualified talent to fill roles.
That’s why over the past year, we’ve helped train and certify more than 23 million people in more than 200 countries in digital skills. We are committed to working with governments, educational institutions, industry and civil society to help millions of people learn to use AI.
Customer snapshot:
The University of South Florida (USF) is partnering with Microsoft to streamline processes and improve innovation for all aspects of university operations with artificial intelligence.
“We’re empowering students to do amazing things with AI as part of tomorrow’s workforce. Our focus on generative AI not only drives operational efficiency, but also empowers our community to unlock new levels of creativity and impact, further positioning USF as a leader in AI adoption, which includes being among the first universities in the country to form a college dedicated to AI, cybersecurity and computing.”
— Sidney Fernandes, CIO & VP of Digital Experiences at the University of South Florida
The growing economic impact of artificial intelligence
Although today’s companies are largely implementing off-the-shelf generative AI solutions and realizing significant ROI, more than half of those surveyed expect to build custom industrial and business applications in the next 24 months — demonstrating that today’s ROI is quickly becoming tomorrow’s competitive advantage.
“We are at an inflection point in the development of autonomous agents and are beginning an evolution from using off-the-shelf assistants and co-pilots to support knowledge discovery and content generation to custom AI agents to execute complex multi-step workflows in the digital world,” said Ritu Jyoti, GVP/GM, AI and data research at IDC. “With the responsible use of technology and the transformation of the workplace, IDC predicts that business spending on AI adoption will have a cumulative global economic impact of $19.9 trillion by 2030 and drive 3.5% of global GDP in 2030.”
Key findings from IDC’s business opportunity artificial intelligence studies include:
- Generative use of artificial intelligence jumps from 55% in 2023 to 75% in 2024.
- For every $1 a company invests in generative AI, the ROI is $3.7x.
- Top leaders using generative AI achieve an ROI of $10.3.
- On average, AI implementation takes less than 8 months, and organizations realize value within 13 months.
- Within 24 months, most organizations plan to expand beyond pre-built AI solutions to advanced AI workloads that are customized or customized.
- The ROI of generative artificial intelligence is highest in financial services, followed by media and telecommunications, mobility, retail and consumer packaged goods, energy, manufacturing, healthcare and education.
- 43% say productivity cases provided the highest ROI.
- The primary way organizations monetize AI today is through productivity cases. In the next 24 months, more focus will be placed on functional and industrial use cases.
- The main obstacle to implementing artificial intelligence is the lack of technical and day-to-day artificial intelligence skills.
Learn how to boost your AI journey
The IDC study, which polled more than 4,000 AI business leaders and decision makers around the world, also identifies the biggest obstacles organizations face in implementing AI. As companies integrate new solutions, they address important issues such as data privacy, responsible use, and the need to invest in technology and skills.
No matter where you are on your cloud and AI transformation journey, Microsoft can help. To learn more about how customers across industries are shaping their AI transformation with Microsoft, visit Microsoft’s AI in Action site. For more on how to start your AI transformation journey, visit Microsoft AI.
IDC InfoBrief: Sponsored by Microsoft, 2024 Business Opportunity of AI, IDC# US52699124, November 2024
