BORACAY, AKLAN — As the Philippine government announced strides in encouraging businesses to embrace artificial intelligence (AI), an official from multinational tech firm Lenovo highlighted that the country is lagging behind its counterparts in AI utilization due to low workforce skills.

In his presentation at the CXO Summit on Friday, Singapore-based Lenovo Solutions Sales Director Kavish Shah revealed that, based on their latest CIO (chief information officer) study, around 42 percent of customers are exploring AI, while 35 percent are actively using it.

“But for the Philippine market, I would say very few customers. Not more than 5 to 10 percent. From a Philippine standpoint, we have a long way to go in the AI space. Why? I would say there’s a problem or shortage of skills here,” according to Shah.

He further emphasized that workers with the right skills are the primary requirement for building effective AI solutions.

“Skills are the most lacking thing in today’s industries,” he added.

Due to this skills gap, Shah said businesses in the Philippines are missing the opportunities that AI could provide to their operations.

“AI will allow you to enhance internal operations and customize your customer experience. The most important aspect of AI is helping companies understand the needs of your business, especially your customers,” he stressed.

Apart from the skills gap, Shah noted that many organizations remain skeptical about adopting AI due to its complexity, associated risks, and high costs.

Having fully utilized AI in its operations, Lenovo is projecting service sales of $49 billion for servers by 2027.

“From our services standpoint, meaning installation, implementation, management, and so on, we are looking at $84 billion. For software, it’s huge, or about $225 billion. For the whole of 2027, we are aiming for total revenue of $408 billion. But as we continue to become the world’s largest end-to-end infrastructure solutions provider, Lenovo unleashes the power of AI to drive intelligent transformation in every aspect of our lives and every industry,” Shah said.

Government Intervention Needed

In a separate press conference at the CXO Summit, Roshan Kumar, Director for Systems Engineering, AI, and Data Management at technology solutions firm Dell, suggested that the Philippine government should emulate initiatives from countries like Singapore to prepare its students for an AI-driven future.

“The first focus of the government is sovereign AI — which is AI built for the nation, by the people. For that, they are investing in higher education, especially in technology and AI-related courses. And for the school’s perspective, the schools and universities are partnering with organizations like us, DELL, Intel, among others. We are not yet doing it in the Philippines, but we are doing it already in Malaysia, Indonesia, and Singapore,” Kumar said.

Last month, IT and Business Process Association of the Philippines (IBPAP) President Jack Madrid admitted that the IT-BPM sector needs talent with advanced skills in AI, big data, and programming to sustain growth. Madrid said they are collaborating with universities and the Department of Education to address the skills gap in the Filipino workforce.

On the government side, the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), with support from the Asian Development Bank, launched the National Artificial Intelligence (AI) Strategy Roadmap 2.0 (NAISR 2.0) and the Center for AI Research (CAIR) in July.

Building on the foundation laid by the first AI roadmap in 2021, NAISR 2.0 incorporates recent technological advancements, including Generative AI, recalibrating strategic actions to address emerging themes such as ethics and governance. The roadmap aligns with the country’s science, technology, and innovation-driven industrial strategy, aiming to harness AI’s transformative potential to boost the economy and improve the quality of life for Filipinos.