Australia's AI ROI Problem Isn't the AI — It's the Data

Transcript

This is Field Notes — your two minutes on the AI news that actually matters to Australian business. Today: Australia's AI ROI Problem Isn't the AI — It's the Data.

SAP's 2026 report: Australian businesses expect AI ROI to hit 37%, but 73% say poor data quality is throttling it and only 22% feel ready on governance.

Australian businesses expect their AI investments to return 37 per cent within two years — nearly double this year's 19 per cent. That is the optimistic half of SAP's Value of AI Report 2026, published on 20 July. The other half is the reason most won't get there, and it has nothing to do with the AI. Here are the four things to take away. First. Australian businesses expect AI ROI to nearly double to 37% within two years, but SAP's Value of AI Report 2026 (20 July) finds the returns are throttled by weak foundations, not weak technology. Second. 73% of Australian businesses report poor data quality holding their AI back, and 64% name integrated, connected data systems as the single most important enabler of AI value. Third. Only 22% feel ready on AI governance (33% globally), and 43% run AI agents with no human-in-the-loop — an unmanaged liability, since the business, not the vendor, owns the mistakes. Fourth. The fix is foundational and cheap: clean, connected data and a human sign-off on anything customer-facing an agent produces — before spending more on AI.

So what does this actually mean for your business? That's the short version — enough to know whether it's worth a closer look this week.

That's your brief for today. Thanks for spending a couple of minutes with me — the links are in the show notes. Field Notes is brought to you by Coterie Labs. I'm Matilda. Until next time.