🔍 Read the full analysis: AI Use Is Growing, But Company Profits Aren’t Following on ThorstenMeyerAI.com
Get the latest gadgets delivered free with Prime
- Fast, free delivery on millions of items
- Prime Video, Amazon Music and more included
- Member-only deals all year
TL;DR
AI use is spreading across companies, but surveys cited in a November 6 report find that substantial profit gains remain limited. McKinsey’s 2026 survey found 6% of respondents’ organizations qualified as AI “high performers,” while BCG reported that 5% of surveyed firms were getting value at scale.
Companies are adopting AI more widely, but only a small share report substantial profit gains, according to surveys and forecasts reviewed in a November 6 report by ThorstenMeyerAI.com. McKinsey’s 2026 survey found that 6% of respondents’ organizations met its definition of AI “high performers,” while BCG reported that 5% of 1,250 surveyed firms were getting value from AI at scale.
The gap between uptake and financial returns appears in several measures, though the studies use different samples and definitions. In McKinsey’s survey of 1,719 respondents, 37% said AI had some effect on their company’s earnings before interest and taxes, or EBIT—a share described in the source report as about the same as a year earlier. The 6% classified as high performers attributed at least 5% of EBIT to AI. The figures were reported by The Register and TechTimes.
BCG’s study of 1,250 companies found that 5% were getting value at scale, while 60% reported no material value. BCG also found a gap in implementation: leaders had deployed 62% of their AI initiatives, compared with 12% among laggards. These findings suggest that experimentation and broad use do not, by themselves, establish that a company has improved its financial performance.
Adoption varies by company size and region. Eurostat data cited in the report show that 20.0% of EU enterprises with at least 10 employees used AI in 2025, up from 13.5%. Use was reported by 55% of large enterprises and 17% of small ones. These figures measure use, not the financial return from that use.
Infographic 01 · Who gets value from AI
Most companies use AI. About 6 percent profit from it in a big way
Adoption keeps rising. The share of companies that can show a large effect on profit has barely moved.
Share of McKinsey’s 2026 respondents who attribute at least 5 percent of their company’s EBIT to AI and call the impact significant. Flat versus 2025, as reported by The Register.
Wide use, thin profit
Different surveys, different bases: read each line with its source
Sources: McKinsey State of AI 2026 (n = 1,719), as reported by The Register, 25 Aug 2026 and TechTimes, 26 Aug 2026 · BCG, The Widening AI Value Gap, Sept 2025 (n = 1,250) · Eurostat, 11 Dec 2025 · Eurostat Statistics Explained (enterprises with 10+ employees). Survey figures are self-reported by executives; Eurostat counts use, not value.
Powered by Thorsten Meyer AI
Why adoption is not translating into profit
The difference between trying AI and earning a return matters to companies deciding where to put money, staff time and management attention. The survey results in the report indicate that AI use is not a reliable proxy for profit impact. Firms may be running pilots or deploying tools without changing the work in ways that affect costs, revenue or productivity at scale.
The report points to workflow redesign as one possible dividing line. BCG says its survey’s strongest value came from reshaping core workflows end to end, rather than relying on isolated pilots. That is a substantial operational undertaking: companies have to connect AI systems to existing processes, decide which decisions they can handle, and establish who is responsible when a case needs human judgment.
There are consequences for employees as well as budgets. McKinsey’s survey found that 80% of respondents who use AI said it made them more productive. At the same time, 39% expected job cuts, up from 32% in the prior survey, according to The Register and TechTimes. The report also says that last year’s actual cuts fell short of what respondents had expected. Those responses describe expectations and reported experience; they do not establish how many jobs AI has eliminated.
Products Worth Considering
Logitech MX Keys Combo for Business Keyboard and Mouse – Graphite
EcoFlow DELTA 3 Portable Power Station (1024Wh, 1800W)
Apple AirPods Pro 3 Wireless Earbuds with Active Noise Cancellation
As an affiliate, we earn on qualifying purchases.
From digitized steps to delegated work
Earlier digital-transformation efforts often moved paper processes onto software while leaving people responsible for interpreting information and making decisions. The report describes AI—and especially AI agents—as a shift toward software handling more steps: reading an invoice or support request, checking related records, drafting a response or taking an action within set limits. An agent is not just a system that answers a question; it can carry out a sequence of tasks.
That shift changes the design challenge. The unit of change becomes the workflow, not just the software tool, and staff may move from performing each step to supervising exceptions and outcomes. The source report cites Gartner’s guidance to use agents when decisions are needed, automation for routine workflows and assistants for simple information retrieval. It also relays Gartner’s warning that adding agents to legacy systems can be technically complex and disrupt existing workflows.
Agent use is still developing. BCG respondents said agents already delivered about 17% of their AI value and expected that share to reach 29% by 2028. McKinsey data, as reported by The Register and TechTimes, found that among companies with more than $1 billion in revenue, 40% said they were scaling agents, up from 27%. The measures reflect survey responses and expectations, not independently verified future results.
“The new promise is not “digitise the process” but “let software process the work.””
— Thorsten Meyer, ThorstenMeyerAI.com
What the surveys cannot establish
The figures do not provide a single, directly comparable measure of AI’s effect on company profits. Eurostat tracks adoption among EU enterprises; McKinsey and BCG survey different groups and use their own definitions of impact, high performance and value at scale. The source material does not provide enough detail to compare the studies’ methods or to determine whether their results represent all companies.
It is also unclear how much of the reported impact is caused by AI rather than other business changes, or how durable the gains will be. Survey responses about EBIT effects, productivity and expected job cuts are not the same as audited financial results or confirmed employment outcomes. Gartner’s project-cancellation figures are forecasts, not reported cancellations.
Gartner forecasts that more than 40% of agentic AI projects will be cancelled by the end of 2027 because of costs, unclear value or weak risk controls. It also forecasts that organizations will abandon 60% of AI projects that lack AI-ready data. The source report gives no project sample or forecast methodology, so the estimates should be read as warnings rather than established outcomes.
What companies will need to show
The next test is whether companies can move from pilots to sustained operational results—and document the connection between AI use and financial outcomes. That will require clearer measures of value, decisions about which workflows to redesign, and controls over what AI systems can do. The available surveys indicate that these steps remain uneven: BCG’s leaders had deployed a larger share of their initiatives than lagging firms, while the overall share reporting material value stayed small.
Data and expertise are practical hurdles. The report says Gartner expects many projects without AI-ready data to be abandoned. It also cites Eurostat findings that 71% of EU firms that considered AI but did not use it named a lack of relevant expertise. The source does not specify the full question wording or respondent base for that figure, so it should not be treated as a measure of every business’s barriers.
Future survey results and company disclosures will help show whether adoption is turning into repeatable returns. For now, the evidence in the report supports a narrower conclusion: AI use is growing, but major profit gains remain uncommon, and the causes of the gap—and how quickly it may narrow—are still uncertain.
Key Questions
Are companies using AI more widely?
Yes, the figures cited in the report show growing adoption in some measures. Eurostat found that 20.0% of EU enterprises with at least 10 employees used AI in 2025, up from 13.5% in 2024.
How many companies report substantial financial gains?
In the figures cited, 6% of McKinsey survey respondents’ organizations qualified as high performers, defined as attributing at least 5% of EBIT to AI. BCG separately found that 5% of 1,250 surveyed firms were getting value at scale; the two measures are not identical.
Does AI use mean a company is more profitable?
No. The report distinguishes adoption from financial impact. A company can use AI without demonstrating that it has increased profits or achieved value at scale.
Why do some AI projects fail to deliver value?
The report cites challenges including unclear value, costs, weak risk controls, difficulty integrating agents into existing workflows and insufficient AI-ready data. Gartner’s cancellation estimates are forecasts, not confirmed results.
What could AI adoption mean for employees?
McKinsey respondents who used AI commonly reported productivity gains, while a larger share expected job cuts than in the prior survey. These are survey responses and expectations; they do not establish the number of jobs AI has eliminated.
Source: ThorstenMeyerAI.com
