1. Your AI strategy can put you ahead — or make it hard to ever catch up

2025 is the year private companies should advance with AI. AI has become both valuable and accessible. In fact, it’s more valuable to private companies than to bigger, public ones, because it makes scale a lot less important. AI can often mimic the benefits of scale, allowing you to leapfrog right past those with larger technology budgets. With a ready-to-use bundle or “starter pack” of services, almost any company can give employees access to secure, risk-managed AI.

To increase ROI, it’s usually better to start with internal use cases in data-heavy functions like finance and tax. But you should have a framework to help you expand these use cases once they’re generating value, then roll out new ones too. That’s how a good AI strategy works — get value fast, then use that value to pay for more AI elsewhere. If you don’t get going on this acceleration of value creation, your competitors may, and you could find yourself racing to catch up.

2. Your workforce could double — thanks to AI agents

If you’re a CFO at a private company, you may have a small team. Maybe it’s just a single analyst. Yet you have a ton of reporting requirements. You’re facing constant pressure to both reduce costs and deliver growth. Now, imagine if your lone analyst had a slew of assistants who can do more than crunch a few numbers. They can come up with new ideas, analyze data, generate reports, even spot and fix their own mistakes.

This force multiplier is what AI agents can now provide. AI agents (which you can access as different functionalities within a large language model) can understand context and act autonomously. They require humans to instruct, manage and oversee them, but they can boost your capacity in both internal functions and the business. They can, for example, research customers and provide your sales teams with customer-specific data, context and forecasts to help them close a deal.

3. ROI for AI depends on Responsible AI

Like any technology, AI carries some risks. But there are tested Responsible AI practices that can help safeguard your data and brand, while enhancing AI’s performance. They don’t have to cost too much. Having the right governance and risk policies in place can help your company innovate faster.

An effective Responsible AI framework may catch mistakes before they start. That avoids costly do-overs. It can increase adoption by growing trust. And right now, can you be sure that employees aren’t uploading your sensitive data into some free public AI model to save time? Responsible AI can give you that certainty and confirm AI is used in a trusted way. A good AI “starter pack” should provide some safeguards, but your people should still learn the basics of using AI responsibly.

4. AI can be a value play — and a boon for sustainability

Everyone in your company should have access to basic AI. But CFOs, together with other top leaders, should identify where more dedicated AI investment can pay for itself most quickly. Some solutions may have these capabilities built into their offerings, helping you more easily forecast ROI.

Whether or not sustainability is a priority, AI can help enhance your supply chain, if you give it secure access to the right data. You could, for example, ask AI, where are inefficiencies in our cost structure and what can we do about them? You could then receive easy-to-understand analysis, suggestions and visuals. Naturally, skilled people should review these suggestions, not accept them blindly. But automating large swathes of data collection, analysis and visualization can transform your ability to improve your cost structure.

5. AI can reduce product development lifecycles in half

AI can reduce the time (and money) required to turn an idea into a product or service. Whether for machine parts, consumer goods or even financial services, you can use AI to virtually design, visualize, prototype and troubleshoot new products.

This usually isn’t the place where most private companies should start with AI. But it’s worth getting ready now. And even for private companies, that may not have a dedicated CIO or large IT team to help, the AI learning curve is fast. Give your R&D teams secure access to AI now. Give them a little upskilling, especially in Responsible AI practices, and encourage them to play with AI. You may soon find them innovating at an extraordinary pace. AI can help you compete on a whole new level, and AI can enable small teams to replicate the hard skills of much larger ones. If you have a great idea, your existing workforce plus AI may be enough for you to win even against much larger companies.

6. AI can transform industry-level competitive landscapes

Across industries, AI will most likely benefit those companies whose data, technology and governance are ready for it. AI-ready retail and consumer companies should use AI for customer service, marketing and supply chain management. For industrial products companies, AI can help drive manufacturing efficiency, R&D and faster go-to-market times. Many technology, media and telecom companies can find new revenue from AI offerings.

No matter the industry, no one can afford to be complacent. AI could soon turn the playing field upside down. Start now with an AI strategy that is backed by ready-to-use services in whatever areas of your business makes the most sense for you.