IDC Says Companies Will Spend $342B On AI Solutions For Digital-First Economy

IDC Says Companies Will Spend $342B On AI Solutions For Digital-First Economy

The artificial intelligence (AI) market is booming these days, with companies forecasted to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on AI solutions for a more digitally focused world.

Revenue for the market is expected to grow 15.2 percent year over year in 2021, which will see it hitting $341.8 billion, according to a press release from the International Data Corporation (IDC) Worldwide Semiannual Artificial Intelligence Tracker.

“Disruption is unsettling, but it can also serve as a catalyst for innovation and transformation,” said Ritu Jyoti, IDC group vice president for AI and Automation Research, in the release. “2020 was the year that accelerated digital transformation and strengthened the value of enterprise AI. We have now entered the domain of AI-augmented work and decision across all the functional areas of a business. Responsible creation and use of AI solutions that can sense, predict, respond and adapt at speed is an important business imperative.”

The market is set to evolve even further in 2022, growing over 18 percent, the release stated. And by 2024, the IDC forecasts that the AI market will hit the $500 billion mark.

AI hardware is set to grow faster than other categories in the next several years, although AI services is predicted to be the fastest growing category by 2023 and onward, according to the release.

“The market for AI servers and storage was less impacted than anticipated by the COVID-19 pandemic and is now rapidly picking up steam again, especially at the edge,” said IDC Research Director of Infrastructure Systems, Platforms and Technologies Peter Rutten in the release. “The infrastructure of choice is coalescing around massively parallel compute using co-processors and server clusters with fast interconnects and networks.”

In other news, Vic.ai Co-Founder and CEO Alexander T. Hagerup told PYMNTS this month that AI could have huge ramifications for accounts payable (AP) automation.

Read more: Artificial Intelligence Levels-Up In Accounts Payable

The tech overall could help solve common pain points like intense configuration or ongoing maintenance. Without that, AI could help boost data extraction, for example.