- 83% of Middle East organisations are increasing their AI investment in 2026, according to Accenture Middle East.
- Globally, 82% of C-suite leaders are increasing AI investment, but only 23% report widespread, sustained business value.
- The findings highlight the need for stronger AI governance, workforce skills and security as organisations move towards agentic AI.
Accenture Middle East reports that 83% of organisations in the region are increasing their AI investment this year, highlighting the pace at which businesses are moving beyond experimentation and towards wider adoption. Saudi Arabia and the UAE were among the 20 countries included in Accenture’s latest Pulse of Change research, which surveyed 3,000 C-suite leaders and 3,000 employees across large organisations.
The global findings show that AI investment remains strong, with 82% of C-suite leaders increasing spending on AI. However, only 23% report having achieved widespread, sustained business value from their AI implementations.
That gap between investment and value has important implications for Middle Eastern organisations, particularly as governments and businesses across the region pursue ambitious digital transformation and AI strategies.
Accenture says the organisations making the most progress are moving beyond individual AI projects and redesigning infrastructure, roles and operating models around the technology. Almost half of companies globally – 49% – are currently piloting or deploying AI agents, while 55% of C-suite leaders are confident that their agentic AI initiatives will deliver board-reportable business outcomes within the next year.
The shift towards agentic AI creates a new set of considerations. AI systems that can act autonomously across business processes potentially increase both the speed and scale of operations, but they also introduce new questions around access, governance, data protection and accountability.
Accenture’s research suggests that workforce readiness is another important part of the equation. Globally, 41% of C-suite leaders believe their organisations are very prepared to respond to talent disruption caused by AI, compared with just 34% of employees.
The skills gap is particularly concentrated in middle management, with 36% of both executives and employees identifying this as the organisation’s largest AI capability gap.
The findings suggest that the Middle East’s strong appetite for AI investment will need to be matched by investment in people, processes and governance if organisations are to turn adoption into lasting value.
For security professionals, that means AI strategy and security strategy increasingly need to develop together. As AI becomes embedded deeper into enterprise systems and critical operations, organisations will need governance frameworks and security controls capable of keeping pace with the technology.
The message from Accenture’s research is therefore less about whether organisations should invest in AI – that momentum is already well established – and more about whether they are prepared to manage the operational, workforce and security implications of putting it to work at scale.
