UK businesses race to embed AI into enterprise workflows
Businesses in the UK are making significant changes in the ways they work as they increasingly embed AI throughout their workflows and to scale and maximise ROI, according to new research by EXL [NASDAQ: EXLS], a global data and AI company. An 86% majority of organisations have significantly changed their operating model to accommodate AI, with 39% having completely redesigned how they work. Over the next year, companies expect half (50%) of their processes will include AI.
The second annual EXL Enterprise AI Study: Driving Execution at Scale (UK Report) is based on a survey of 190 UK-based C-suite and other senior decision makers across the banking and finance, insurance, retail, utilities, and healthcare payer industries. Its findings shine a spotlight on the massive growth of enterprise GenAI implementations to date but also warn of data quality issues, talent shortages, and other roadblocks that could curtail some of the early progress companies have made as they move deeper into company-wide enterprise AI initiatives.
The following are some of the report’s key findings:
- Finance Leading the Charge: Leaders have emerged in the AI space, and the survey defines these organisations as those that have developed AI capabilities in at least five of the seven common business functions analysed in the report. Leaders were most likely to come from the banking and finance sector (18%), followed by utilities (16%), insurance (12%), and retail (10%).
- Transforming to Enable AI in the Workflow: Organisations are developing new operating models to accommodate AI usage across their enterprise workflows. Overall, 86% of UK corporations have either made significant changes to their operating models (47%) or completely redesigned enterprise-wide operating models (39%) to integrate AI throughout their organisations.
- Barriers Still Persist: Despite an average of £23.2 million per company in AI investment, barriers to adoption persist. The largest of these are cost or budget constraints, followed by concerns about data privacy and security, and the lack of a clear AI strategy or vision. What’s more, nearly 70% of companies say they have yet to achieve the data accessibility, efficiency, quality, consistency, and transparency required for AI to thrive in their organisations.
- Companies Eye the Best Ways to Scale AI: Overall, 88% of respondents said it’s very or extremely important for their organization to scale their AI initiatives in the coming year. Executives ranked implementing AI governance (42%) and improving data quality and accessibility (42%) as their top priorities.
- Retailers Eager to Make Larger Investments: Retailers are the most likely (42%) to say they are ramping up GenAI significantly, followed by utilities (30%), banking and finance (24%), and insurers (9%).
“The only way large corporations can truly capitalise on the full power of AI is by integrating the technology into enterprise workflows,” said Anand “Andy” Logani, chief data and AI officer at EXL. “Executed well, the right AI strategy has the ability to deliver unmatched business value without disrupting core business functions.”
The full report, 2025 EXL Enterprise AI Study: Driving AI Execution at Scale (UK Report), can be accessed here.