Enterprises face problems integrating AI

New research from Tray.io shows that over 90 percent of enterprises are currently experiencing limitations integrating AI into their tech stack.

Almost three-quarters of companies (73 percent) report that more than half of the apps in their tech stack have AI capabilities or AI-augmented features, and 96 say they percent plan to use these features to improve process efficiency and employee productivity, increase customer satisfaction rates and reduce costs.

But this rapid proliferation of AI within existing SaaS apps is causing significant integration pains, including challenges with provisioning and on-going management, lack of AI implementation frameworks and issues surrounding change management within the organization.

Complicating things even more is a disconnect between executives and practitioners around AI implementation strategies. Almost half of enterprise executives (48 percent) say their organization's AI implementation strategy for the next year is focused on building strong integrations between their internal SaaS apps and AI, while close to 20 percent of practitioners say their organization doesn't have an AI strategy as it relates to their tech stack and internal business processes. 32 percent of executives anticipate encountering employee pushback as they implement AI in the enterprise.

"As enterprises embark on their AI implementation journeys, how can they unify their team and manage the functionality of dozens of different AI features without overwhelming their technical teams and causing conflicts between connected apps," says Rich Waldron, CEO and co-founder of Tray.io. "Properly harnessing the power of AI in a safe and effective way requires companies to centralize on a solution built for the AI era, and use it as the control center where precise decisions can be made about where and how to infuse AI into business processes for the best outcomes."

The report also shows that SaaS bloat remains a challenge with 55 percent of companies reporting that they have more than 50 SaaS apps and 37 percent saying they have more than 100. 40 percent of respondents plan to use the built-in AI features for more than half of their SaaS apps.

As part of their AI business process strategy, 57 percent of executives intend to use the app-specific AI for each SaaS app in their tech stack. In contrast, only 32 percent of practitioners and team leads state this will be the primary focus for their organization -- and almost 20 percent of practitioners say their organizations don't have an AI strategy as it relates to their tech stack and internal business processes.

"While the Autonomous Enterprise is the desired end state for all organizations, going down the path of implementing the AI features of every SaaS app will undoubtedly lead to a new slew of unintended consequences. To move forward with AI integration in a sustainable way, enterprises will need to centralize them on a single platform that simplifies development and ongoing management," adds Waldron.

You can read more on the Tray.io site.

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