Philippine CEOs bullish on AI, but cite talent, infrastructure gaps — Deloitte

PHILIPPINE chief executive officers (CEOs) are confident in using artificial intelligence (AI) in major company decisions, but workforce readiness and infrastructure deficiencies remain key bottlenecks, according according to advisory services firm Deloitte Philippines.

- By Beatriz Marie D. Cruz

“The CEOs want to adopt, but the people below or the infrastructure is not ready,” Deloitte Philippines Country Manager Ramon Chito F. Ramos, Jr. said in an interview with BusinessWorld on June 25.

“People are resisting change, they’re not upskilled to know how to use AI,” he said.

Mr. Ramos also noted that many AI users in the Philippines are still in the “pilot stage,” which yield limited benefits instead of enterprise-wide efficiency.

To move beyond the experimental use of AI, companies should focus on what outcome or business problem it’s trying to solve using their AI tools, he said.

“There should be a mindset shift in the way you do it. Otherwise, everybody’s just rushing to adopt the latest tool and they don’t know what to do,” Mr. Ramos noted.

Some Filipino firms do not have the necessary infrastructure to scale their AI use, and the unstable internet connectivity in several areas remain a challenge.

“Among the companies I’m working with, some big ones are not even on newer technology. They’re maybe on AS/400, those very old mainframe computers,” he noted.