"You take a risk if you stand still"

Newly graduated PhD Einav Perez-Andersson was surprised when she examined the data maturity of the county's business community—where almost no one had started working with AI.

"All companies should make some kind of decision about their future when it comes to this new technology.

Change or be changed — these are the dramatic words in the title of Einav Perez-Andersson's new thesis on organizations and AI. It's not quite that dramatic, she explains when we meet in her office at JTH for a chat about her research.

"It's a bit exaggerated, but — the technology is here now. Some industries have to change, others will change," she says, recalling the classic concept of the "Kodak moment," which describes how the venerable company misjudged and underestimated the transition to digital photography. So is an industrial revolution underway?

That can only be seen after many years, says Einav, who has a PhD in business administration and combines economic issues with technical research at JTH.

"The technology is revolutionary, but does it affect everything in our lives? No. Not yet. There are too many issues that we don't have a handle on yet—AI may be banned," she says somewhat provocatively, but concludes that technology will definitely change how we do things.

"We have a long way to go, and no one is really there yet," she says, describing her findings in her thesis, which is based on work with both the public sector and the business community in Jönköping County.

A strategy is required

In the municipality of Jönköping, Einav Perez-Andersson has met with all the administrative managers and has particularly immersed herself in the possibilities of AI at the Technical Office, in an effort to improve the information provided to residents about snow removal routes. In the private sector, she examined the maturity level of 246 manufacturing companies and placed them on a four-level scale, with almost all of them ending up in the lower half.

"We focused on the technical conditions companies have for implementing AI. Many have a lot of data, but it is unstructured—perhaps in Excel documents.

Structuring it and making it usable is the basis of AI. We also found old infrastructure, different 'islands' that don't talk to each other. How do you bring it all together?

When it comes to obstacles, she believes that the difference between the public sector and the business sector is not that great.

"There are IT systems that don't talk to each other, and there's data, but it's not structured. However, the most important challenge is people, says Einav Perez-Andersson.

"It's about knowledge, education, and culture. There is a great need to scale up the people. Some businesses are doing well and don't think they need to change, like Kodak. You may want to lead or follow, but you need to do some kind of evaluation—if you stay, you're taking a risk.

Einav wants to inspire rather than scare people with her thesis, but she is surprised that we haven't come further in Sweden. Germany, France, and England are further ahead in AI, she explains.

"We are a rich country, but there are many fears. My gut feeling is that it's partly a cultural issue when it comes to privacy, as there are fewer rules in other countries.

Einav Perez-Andersson now wants to help businesses be more active and improve their use of data, and she is expanding her research on data maturity to 500 companies.

"There is much room for improvement in daily work, such as eliminating tedious and repetitive tasks in administration and production. It is easy to get started, but every company must map out its current situation, the next steps, and have a strategy. We cannot just wait."