AI Is Everywhere, But Progress Is Slow - McKinsey Explains Why
HPCwire, Tuesday, November 11th, 2025
Just 39% of companies claim that AI has had an enterprise-wide impact. For a lot of leaders, 2025 was meant to be the year that transformed their business using AI. Instead, McKinsey's latest report demonstrates that most companies are still spinning their wheels with experiments and can't scale AI in a meaningful way across the organization.
The tools are there. The impact? Remains elusive - particularly on the bottom line.
But the report also conveys a clear message: The companies who are thriving in the AI era are doing much more than building models. They're building systems. They're aggregating data, governance and workflows into AI-ready infrastructure that delivers at scale. If you're stuck in pilot purgatory, this is your roadmap out.
That roadmap starts with a harsh reality: almost two-thirds of companies (63%) are still in the pilot phase. The McKinsey survey reveals that although AI has been tested across functions, it is seldom deployed across the enterprise. There may be a chatbot in customer service or a forecasting model in supply chain, but they're disconnected, fragile, and far from scaled.