Artificial intelligence is being woven more deeply into Chinese enterprises’ production processes, with high-return-on-investment applications concentrated in areas such as internal knowledge work, IT and software, and sales and marketing, according to a recent survey.

A market study conducted by Deloitte China and the University of Hong Kong (HKU) found that more than 64 percent of about 200 organizations across the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region and the Chinese mainland have expanded AI adoption in production use, over 8 percentage points more than last year.

Among them, 33.7 percent reported using the technology across multiple teams, up from 14.7 percent the year before.

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The survey, which was released on Tuesday, gathered responses from 205 senior executives representing leading organizations in the SAR and the mainland across industries, including healthcare, manufacturing, financial services and retail. It investigates how firms are transitioning from early-stage AI use to scalable implementation and identifies the areas where AI adoption is creating the greatest value.

When asked which AI-supported tasks have delivered the highest estimated return on investment (ROI), most respondents pointed to internal knowledge work as well as sales and marketing. Other high-ROI use cases included IT and software, product, and research and development, where efficiency gains and cost savings are driving measurable impacts, according to the survey.

However, many respondents said the ROI they had realized from using AI fell short of expectations, citing factors such as entrenched processes and incentives favoring the status quo, data quality and availability, and security concerns.

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“It is not a surprise in the sense that it's well known that there is a so-called technological J-curve inside AI adoption -- which is that initially you go down but eventually you go up,” explained Li Jin, director of the Centre for AI, Management and Organization at HKU, which led the study.

“This shows that, other than technology alone, people, processes, all these things will be important in moving forward with this,” he said.

AI adoption has become mainstream across Hong Kong’s corporate sector. A separate survey released by local telecom giant Hong Kong Telecommunications in late July found that 67 percent of roughly 300 local companies asked had either implemented, are piloting, or plan to use AI.

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More than half cited boosting overall operational efficiency as their primary objective in AI adoption, along with other factors such as automating routine tasks and cutting costs. In addition, over 80 percent said they intend to invest in AI over the next 12 months, according to the survey.

In his weekly blog on Sunday, Financial Secretary Paul Chan Mo-po cited a report by a multinational tech firm estimating that if AI adoption among Hong Kong’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) were to catch up with large corporations by 2035, it could unlock as much as HK$65 billion ($8.29 billion) in economic benefits for the city.

To further support local enterprises, the HKSAR government plans to roll out an enhanced version of the Digital Transformation Support Pilot Programme later this year, aiming to help SMEs adopt ready-to-use AI solutions.

Contact the writer at gabylin@chinadailyhk.com