UK firms see strong returns from AI adoption research

Akeneo has published research showing that 87% of UK organisations using AI are seeing measurable returns, placing the UK among the strongest-performing markets in the study.

The survey covered 1,000 senior IT decision-makers across the UK, US, France, Germany and Italy, with 200 respondents in each country. Across all five markets, 83% said AI adoption had delivered either significant measurable returns or moderate improvements.

In the UK, 44% said they were seeing significant, measurable benefits and return on investment from AI adoption. Another 43% reported moderate improvements in productivity or cost savings.

The findings suggest UK businesses are taking a more commercial approach than many peers when assessing AI projects. Some 64% of UK respondents said they measure AI through efficiency and cost savings, compared with 55% across the full sample.

The UK also led the surveyed markets in tracking AI's contribution to revenue growth. That measure was used by 60% of UK respondents, ahead of 57% in the US, 36% in France, 35% in Italy and 34% in Germany.

Customer experience quality was measured by 53% of UK organisations, while 37% said they monitor error reduction. No UK respondents said their organisation does not currently measure AI's impact.

IT productivity

The strongest immediate effects were reported in IT departments. According to the findings, 97% of UK respondents said AI had improved IT productivity in some way.

Of those, 44% said AI had delivered significant gains by reducing manual effort or time spent on core IT tasks across multiple workflows. A further 53% said it had brought moderate improvements in specific tasks or teams.

Only 2% said AI had produced no noticeable productivity change. Another 2% said it had increased workloads because of added complexity, data preparation, governance or oversight.

The UK compared favourably with other major markets in the survey. In the US, 41% reported significant IT productivity gains, while the figure was 35% in both France and Italy, and 28% in Germany.

Data foundations

The study also pointed to relatively high confidence in the quality of data feeding AI systems in the UK. Some 95% of UK respondents rated the product and operational data used by their AI systems as good or excellent.

Within that group, 43% described their data as accurate, consistent, well-governed and trusted across teams. Internationally, 36% rated their data as excellent.

Structured enterprise systems were the most common data sources for AI in the UK. Some 71% cited platforms such as PIM, ERP, DAM and CRM systems, above the international average of 65%, as well as 60% in the US and 56% in France.

UK organisations also reported a high level of readiness to support AI-driven commerce. The research found that 98% described themselves as very or somewhat ready across areas including data quality, integration, governance, skills and scalability.

Some 56% said they were very confident, behind the US at 62% but ahead of France at 46%, Italy at 45% and Germany at 34%.

Even so, preparing data remains a large part of AI work. UK respondents estimated that 43% of total AI project effort is spent cleaning, structuring or labelling data rather than developing models, against an international average of 45%.

Budget plans

Many organisations expect to increase spending. In the UK, 84% said AI budgets would rise over the next one to two years, including 36% who expected a significant increase.

The US showed the strongest intention to spend more, with 92% expecting budgets to increase and 45% forecasting a significant rise. The equivalent figure for an overall budget increase was 89% in Italy, 87% in France and 84% in Germany.

IT automation was the leading UK investment priority for the next one to three years, selected by 68% of respondents. Skills development and customer support were each cited by 34%, followed by compliance and governance at 33%.

Confidence in AI's longer-term impact also remained strong. Some 96% of UK respondents said they were optimistic about its effect on their organisations over the next three years, including 57% who said they were very optimistic.

Romain Fouache, Chief Executive Officer at Akeneo, said the survey showed a shift in how companies judge AI projects. "AI has reached the point where businesses are no longer being asked simply whether they are using it, but what it is contributing. Across every market in this research, organisations are reporting tangible returns, but the UK stands out for connecting AI investment particularly closely to efficiency, productivity and revenue growth. The next challenge is turning individual gains into repeatable, scalable value. For commerce businesses, that means giving AI access to trusted, governed and usable product information. Without that foundation, organisations will continue to spend too much time preparing and reconciling data, and AI will struggle to make reliable decisions, support better customer experiences or contribute consistently to business performance."