AI can boost productivity, potentially increase revenue, but many Asean firms struggle with roll-out: Bain

[SINGAPORE] Companies operating in South-east Asia are receptive to leveraging artificial intelligence applications in their workflows, as these applications are being viewed as tools that can enable growth.

Yet, at the same time, many companies in the region are struggling to scale AI adoption within their workflows.

“What’s common in South-east Asia is that the focus is on growth. How to take advantage of technology to accelerate growth,” said Shintaro Okuno, Asia-Pacific regional managing partner at Bain & Company.

But Okuno also noted that despite the excitement, what Bain has seen with many firms that they work with are that these companies are muddling through their AI roll-outs. 

According to Bain, fewer than 20 per cent of the companies it works with in South-east Asia are meaningfully scaling their AI investments, and two-thirds of the firms are stuck in the pilot and planning stage.

Firms in the financial services sector tend to be ahead of other sectors when it comes to including the use of AI applications in workflows.

But companies in other sectors sometimes struggle with AI adoption, with reasons ranging from wariness over unsystematic roll-outs to the fear of employee unwillingness to adopt.

His advice, which is what Bain has been advising clients as well, is to pick two or three “commercial plays” or segments that can benefit from using AI applications and fits the business need, and then “go deep” in those segments.

That means being able to move from proof of concept to successfully scaling adoption. 

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Okuno said: “Make a success case. Make two or three of these branches be successful. That’s usually the best way to provide confidence to the management level and also organisational level...

“This provides an opportunity for almost everybody to really understand this is a beneficial technology, gain more trust, gain more excitement, so when you move to the next use case it’s going to be much faster, much easier.”

Okuno’s view is not isolated.

While the South-east Asia region is viewed as being generally receptive to adopting AI, there have been reports and views that organisations may be struggling to scale from pilot to production. 

Successfully scaling from pilot to production could have tangible benefits for organisations.

The sector that will see the biggest time savings is the financial services sector, followed by consumer and healthcare. 

Bain also estimates that successful roll-outs of AI tools will result in significant sales uplift for companies in the region as well.

Where Bain currently sees the most usefulness for AI tools is in workflows dealing with market intelligence, inventory and assortment, pricing and quoting, and guided selling. 

Okuno said: “So far, most of the use cases are about making the customer-facing people more efficient and more productive. Basically, selling more stuff.”