* Digital native executives are the most likely industry group to rank “embed AI across core business processes at scale” as their #1 AI investment priority: 18%, nearly 2x the cross-industry average. * AI is already delivering value: nearly 92% of digital native executives say AI ROI is ahead of plan, compared with 84% overall. * But ROI momentum is not the same as maturity. Digital natives lead on fully embedded AI in only 1 of 8 business functions, showing a gap between AI value creation and AI operationalization.

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A new Economist Enterprise survey of 1,220+ global executives reveals a paradox for digital native companies: they lead all industries in AI scaling ambition (18% name it their top priority, nearly 2x the cross-industry average) and report strong ROI (92% ahead of plan), yet they lead on fully embedded AI in only 1 of 8 business functions. Industries like telecom, media, and manufacturing outpace digital natives on full AI embedding in several core functions despite lower stated ambition. The gap is attributed to architectural shortcomings — lack of governed data access, reliable pipelines, observability, SLAs, and shared governance infrastructure — rather than a lack of value or intent. The key challenge for tech companies is converting deployed AI into production-grade, repeatable, governed operations.

The AI Scaling Gap Hiding in Digital Native Companies

Prioritizing scale does not create a maturity lead