Irish businesses are hopeful that a new generation of AI technology will boost productivity and reshape the workplace, but they still have a long way to go to take full advantage of the developments, new research has found.
The study by PwC said AI agents – AIs that can autonomously perform tasks on behalf of users – could also help reduce costs, but further investment was needed to ensure Irish companies kept up with their US peers.
This study looked at trends in AI agents across organizations in Ireland and compared the results to a similar study in the United States.
Adoption and trust in the technology was found to be lower in Ireland than in the US, and PwC described it as a “huge opportunity” for Irish businesses.
70% of Irish organizations plan to increase their AI budget over the next 12 months, but less than 10% say they are broadly deploying the technology, and 83% say they have “limited adoption” or are considering AI agents. This is higher than the 67% who reported testing or partially implementing AI at the beginning of the year.
However, only 7% said they have high trust in technology to perform activities such as performing financial transactions or acting autonomously in customer interactions.
Just over half of Irish respondents said they had seen “measurable productivity gains” from using AI agents, but only 38% said it led to cost savings.
David Lee, chief technology officer at PwC Ireland, said: “These results highlight that Irish organizations are taking their time experimenting with AI agents to ensure they understand and trust the technology, rather than rushing to full-scale implementation.”
“While Irish organizations are focused on operational and support functions, US companies are more actively leveraging AI agents across a wide range of business areas, including innovation and strategic functions.”
More than half of Irish business leaders said they believe AI agents will provide a significant competitive advantage over the next 12 months, second only to 73% in the US, and nearly 30% said they believe the technology has the potential to “significantly change” their operating model. This was lower than the 50% recorded in the US survey.
Only 16 per cent of Irish companies are developing new agent products or services, and 11 per cent are redesigning processes around AI agents, compared to 42 per cent in the US.
Barriers to adoption include data issues and the integration of AI agents with legacy systems.
“Organizations need to broaden their thinking about AI from being an efficiency enhancer to an enabler of reinvention,” Lee said. “This allows organizations to look beyond back-office operations to customer-facing, revenue-generating activities.”
