For transformation to succeed, it needs to move beyond hype to hard numbers.
After all, executives can overestimate short-term gains and underestimate long-term phase-shifts when it comes to digital innovation.
But the PYMNTS Intelligence August 2025 CAIO Report, “From Experiment to Imperative: US Product Leaders Bet on Gen AI,” reveals that the adoption curve of generative artificial intelligence (AI) is proving to be an exception. In just 18 months, corporate leaders have shifted their expectations from incremental productivity boosts to wholesale operational redesign.
The data found a 98% consensus among U.S. product leaders that generative AI will reshape operations in the next three years. The participants came from companies generating at least $250 million in annual revenue. They weren’t founders tinkering in garages or early adopters chasing hype. These are seasoned executives, the ones who approve budgets, sign vendor contracts, and shape the roadmaps that determine whether a product survives the next quarterly review.
And 9.8 out of 10 of them think generative AI is becoming an executive imperative.
AI Shows Maturation Curve
Per the report, Gen AI is no longer seen as an “innovation project” off to the side. Instead, it’s moving into the same category as cloud computing and cybersecurity: an infrastructure-level necessity.
What does this mean for the solution provider and software vendor landscape? It means that it is still early days. No single generative AI provider has captured a decisive cross-industry lead. Instead, the market looks like a patchwork quilt.
OpenAI, for example, dominates in technology, with 50% of tech CPOs surveyed by PYMNTS Intelligence naming it as their preferred provider. For its part, Google holds the edge in goods, at 30%; while Microsoft leads in services, at 24%, trailed closely by Nvidia and Google at 19% each.
This fragmentation reflects both the relative youth of the market and the highly specialized demands of different industries. Tech companies prize model performance and developer tools; manufacturers value integration with supply chain systems; service providers prioritize compliance, auditability and customer interaction quality.
But fragmentation can’t last forever. As AI capabilities converge and procurement teams look for scale advantages, vendor consolidation, or at least strategic alliances, feels inevitable. The question is whether that consolidation will be driven by technical superiority, pricing leverage or regulatory gatekeeping.
Why This Isn’t Just Another Technology Cycle
Choosing an AI provider in 2025 is as much about risk management as it is about technical capability.
Per the report, OpenAI appeals to firms seeking leading-edge models and developer flexibility, while Google wins points for enterprise data integration and multilingual capabilities. At the same time, Microsoft offers embedded AI within familiar enterprise software ecosystems, making adoption smoother for risk-averse sectors, while Nvidia brings hardware-software integration advantages, particularly for companies with heavy compute needs.
Many executives are hedging by diversifying: using one provider for internal R&D, another for customer-facing applications, and a third for specialized analytics. This mirrors the early cloud era, when companies maintained both AWS and Azure footprints to mitigate dependency.
Skeptics might argue that generative AI is following the familiar hype-curve path: initial exuberance, inevitable disillusionment, eventual normalization.
But the 2025 data suggests something different. Rather than a “burst-then-bust” cycle, we’re seeing a rapid migration from proof-of-concept to embedded utility — more akin to the smartphone or broadband internet adoption curve than to the short-lived waves of, say, metaverse hype.
The most telling, and perhaps troubling, implication of the survey may be the gap between recognition and readiness.
Nearly all CPOs believe generative AI will transform their business. But many still operate in organizations where the culture resists rapid change, where pilot programs stall for lack of executive sponsorship, or where procurement cycles can’t keep pace with technology refresh rates.
Source: https://www.pymnts.com/
