There is a widening global divide between organisations leading in AI adoption and those still formulating their strategy as just 13% are identified as “AI Leaders” whose organisations are ahead in both AI investment and implementation.
According to Rackspace Technology 64% of these leaders report realising substantial benefits from AI, compared to only 32% of all other respondents. AI Leaders are also three times more likely to be scaling deployments and running AI agents in production.
Rackspace commissioned a survey conducted by Coleman Parkes Research in March and April 2025. Findings are based on the responses of 1,420 IT decision-makers, including 269 who are based in the Asia-Pacific region.
“AI Leaders,” who are defined as those who have embedded AI into their business strategy, are outpacing their peers across every key metric, from enhancing the customer experience and launching new products to boosting employee productivity.
They also lead in overall AI readiness, with 95% achieving strategic alignment on AI across the organisation, and three-quarters reporting that their workforce has been fully trained to utilise their AI tools and solutions.
The report shows that AI investment continues to accelerate, with the average business investment in AI surging nearly 250% from 2024 to 2025 – from $2.5 million to $8.7 million globally and to $11.3 million in APAC, the highest regional investment globally.
Also, 90% of APAC respondents also expect their organisations to continue increasing their AI investments over the next five years. These investments are being evenly divided between the development of in-house solutions and the adoption of third-party products.
The research also shows that new investments are aimed at scaling AI initiatives, with organisations expecting a 33% increase in the average number of AI projects in production in 2025.
In addition, two-thirds (65%) of respondents in APAC anticipate a positive return on their AI investments within the next two years, while an additional 26% expect returns within three to five years.
The report also reveals a shift in how organisations perceive AI. It’s no longer seen as just a tool for internal optimisation and automation, but instead a strategic asset with broader business value.
Among respondents, 90% identified customer experience and productivity as the top AI use case. When measuring the success of AI initiatives, customer experience in APAC most commonly tracked KPI at 51%, surpassing revenue and profitability (48%).
Additionally, the research findings indicate that businesses are increasingly applying AI to enhance their products (24%).
Cybersecurity remains a top-three risk factor for AI adoption. However, this year’s data suggests a shift in mindset. Rather than viewing security solely as a risk, more organisations now see AI as a tool to strengthen cybersecurity itself.
Cybersecurity was ranked as the most transformative AI application over the next three to five years, with process optimisation as a close second. The AI Leaders are addressing cybersecurity challenges by embedding defences at the source, for example, building security protocols and procedures into AI applications.
Despite the increase in AI deployments, respondents still find that their businesses struggle to scale the technology properly, with 72% of APAC respondents indicating that the implementation and scalability of AI remain challenging. Also, 79% agree that investing in infrastructure is crucial for enabling the scalability and flexibility needed for AI initiatives.
Further, across all industries, a majority of respondents say ensuring their AI systems comply with increasingly strict data privacy regulations is a challenge they will have to contend with over the next three to five years.
In addition, the AI Leaders are significantly more likely than their peers to leverage hybrid cloud strategies when scaling their initiatives. The report also found that the remaining respondents relied on a mix of different cloud strategies.
