A growing gap between artificial intelligence early adopters and everyone else is emerging, according to a study by the Association of International Certified Professional Accountants (AICPA and CIMA).
The research, which was in partnership with North Carolina State University’s Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) Initiative, looks into how executives perceive the opportunities and risks of artificial intelligence (AI) across regions, industries, and organizational sizes, polling 1,735 executives across eight regions and eight industries.
The study found an increasingly uneven AI landscape across the enterprise: while a subset of “AI‑Transformed Entities” is capitalising on strategic gains, most organisations lack the talent, systems, and governance capabilities required to deploy AI effectively.
Among the 453 “early adopter” organisations reporting “mostly” or “extensively” that AI is already impacting their business model:
- 73% say AI is providing strategic advantage.
- 54% worry competitors may leverage AI more effectively.
- Risk vigilance increases dramatically: 69% classify AI as a Top 10 or major risk concern.
- Board‑level attention is also higher: 65% report that AI risk is a focus of executive leadership (vs. 30% overall).
According to AICPA&CIMA, these show that organisations achieving meaningful AI integration are simultaneously gaining strategic lift and facing escalating pressure to manage emerging risks.
Moreover, the study found that despite rising enthusiasm around AI, most organisations remain operationally unprepared. As only 24 - 27% of those polled report have adequate AI‑skilled talent, IT system readiness, or regulatory preparedness.
This readiness divide suggests that early adopters are reinforcing their strategic lead through deliberate capability building, while slower adopters risk falling further behind.
Further, East/Southeast Asia are among the regions reporting 36 - 42% strategic impact and advantage in terms of levels of AI‑driven business model transformation
The study also shows 46% of organisations now classify AI as either a Top 10 risk or a major risk concern, a jump of 69% among AI-Transformed organisations -- clear evidence that AI benefits and AI risks scale together, signalling the growing need for robust governance, model risk management, and cross‑functional oversight as AI moves from experimentation to enterprise integration.
