The report places the UK ahead of its G7 counterparts in terms of AI adoption but also underscores areas ripe for improvement, such as support for SMEs, fostering cross-sector partnerships, and investing in talent development.

Zahra Bahrololoumi CBE, UKI CEO at Salesforce, commented: “Agentic AI is revolutionising enterprise software by enabling humans and agents to collaborate seamlessly and drive customer success.

“The UK AI Readiness Index positively highlights that the UK has both the vision and infrastructure to be a powerhouse globally in AI, and lead the current third wave of agentic AI.”

UK AI adoption sets the stage for agentic revolution

The Index details how both the public and private sectors in the UK have embraced AI’s transformative potential. With a readiness score of 65.5, surpassing the G7 average of 61.2, the UK is establishing itself as a hub for large-scale AI projects, driven by a robust innovation culture and pragmatic regulatory approaches.

The government has played its part in maintaining a stable and secure environment for tech investment. Initiatives such as the AI Safety Summit at Bletchley Park and risk-oriented AI legislation showcase Britain’s leadership on critical AI issues like transparency and privacy.

Business readiness is equally impressive, with UK industries scoring 52, well above the G7 average of 47.8. SMEs in the UK are increasingly prioritising AI adoption, further bolstering the nation’s stance in the international AI arena.

Adam Evans, EVP & GM of Salesforce AI Platform, is optimistic about the evolution of agentic AI. Evans foresees that, by 2025, these agents will become business-aware—expertly navigating industry-specific challenges to execute meaningful tasks and decisions.

Investments fuelling AI growth

Salesforce is committing $4 billion to the UK’s AI ecosystem over the next five years. Since establishing its UK AI Centre in London, Salesforce says it has engaged over 3,000 stakeholders in AI training and workshops.

Key investment focuses include creating a regulatory bridge between the EU’s rules-based approach and the more relaxed US approach, and ensuring SMEs have the resources to integrate AI. A strong emphasis also lies on enhancing digital skills and centralising training to support the AI workforce of the future.

Feryal Clark, Minister for AI and Digital Government, said: “These findings are further proof the UK is in prime position to take advantage of AI, and highlight our strength in spurring innovation, investment, and collaboration across the public and private sector.

“There is a global race for AI and we’ll be setting out plans for how the UK can use the technology to ramp-up adoption across the economy, kickstart growth, and build an AI sector which can scale and compete on the global stage.”

Antony Walker, Deputy CEO at techUK, added: “To build this progress, government and industry must collaborate to foster innovation, support SMEs, invest in skills, and ensure flexible regulation, cementing the UK’s leadership in the global AI economy.”

Agentic AI boosting UK business productivity 

Capita, Secret Escapes, Heathrow, and Bionic are among the organisations that have adopted Salesforce’s Agentforce to boost their productivity.

Adolfo Hernandez, CEO of Capita, said: “We want to transform Capita’s recruitment process into a fast, seamless and autonomous experience that benefits candidates, our people, and our clients.

“With autonomous agents providing 24/7 support, our goal is to enable candidates to complete the entire recruitment journey within days as opposed to what has historically taken weeks.

Secret Escapes, a curator of luxury travel deals, finds autonomous agents crucial for personalising services to its 60 million European members.

Kate Donaghy, Head of Business Technology at Secret Escapes, added: “Agentforce uses our unified data to automate routine tasks like processing cancellations, updating booking information, or even answering common travel questions about luggage, flight information, and much more—freeing up our customer service agents to handle more complex and last-minute travel needs to better serve our members.”

The UK’s AI readiness is testament to the synergy between government, business, and academia. To maintain its leadership, the UK must sustain its focus on collaboration, skills development, and innovation. 

(Photo by Matthew Wiebe)

See also: Generative AI use soars among Brits, but is it sustainable?

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo taking place in Amsterdam, California, and London. The comprehensive event is co-located with other leading events including Intelligent Automation Conference, BlockX, Digital Transformation Week, and Cyber Security & Cloud Expo.

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The Playbook looks at stories from various industries to see what problems AI is solving, who’s driving these initiatives, and how it’s reshaping strategies.

Salesforce, well known for its CRM software used by over 150,000 companies like Amazon and Walmart, is no stranger to innovation. It also owns Slack, the popular workplace communication app. Salesforce is now stepping up its AI game with Agentforce, a platform that lets businesses to build and deploy digital agents to automate tasks such as creating sales reports and summarising Slack conversations.

What problem is it solving?

Salesforce has been working with AI for years. In 2016, it launched Einstein, an AI feature baked into its CRM platform. Einstein handled basic scriptable tasks, but the rise of generative AI brought a chance to do more. Smarter tools could now make better decisions and understand natural language.

This sparked a transformation. First came Einstein GPT, then Einstein Copilot, and now Agentforce—a platform designed for flexibility with prebuilt and customisable agents to handle diverse business needs.

“Our customers wanted more. Some wanted to tweak the agents we offer, while others wanted to create their own,” said Tyler Carlson, Salesforce’s VP of Business Development.

The tech behind it

Agentforce is powered by Salesforce’s Atlas Reasoning Engine, developed in-house. The platform connects with AI models from major players like OpenAI, Anthropic, Amazon, and Google, giving businesses access to a variety of tools.

Slack has become a testing ground for these AI agents. Currently in beta, Agentforce’s Slack integration puts automations where employees already spend their time. “Slack makes these tools easy to use and accessible,” Carlson added.

Smarter, more flexible AI

Agentforce uses ReAct prompting, a technique that helps agents break down problems into smaller steps and adjust their approach as they go. This leads to more accurate responses and hands-off task management, from answering questions to scheduling meetings.

Agentforce works with Salesforce’s proprietary LLMs and third-party models, giving clients plenty of options. To ensure security, Salesforce enforces strict data privacy policies, including limits on data retention.

Making it work for businesses

With tools like Agentbuilder, companies can design AI agents tailored to their needs. For example, an agent could sort emails or answer specific HR questions using internal data. One example is Salesforce’s collaboration with Workday to create an AI service agent for employee queries.

Salesforce is already seeing results, with Agentforce resolving 90% of customer inquiries in early trials. The goal? Broader adoption, more capabilities, and higher workloads handled by these agents.

“We’re building a bigger ecosystem of partners and skills,” Carlson said. “By next year, we want Agentforce to be a must-have for businesses.”

(Photo by Unsplash)

See also: Paul O’Sullivan, Salesforce: Transforming work in the GenAI era

Want to learn more about AI and big data from industry leaders? Check out AI & Big Data Expo taking place in Amsterdam, California, and London. The comprehensive event is co-located with other leading events including Intelligent Automation Conference, BlockX, Digital Transformation Week, and Cyber Security & Cloud Expo.

Explore other upcoming enterprise technology events and webinars powered by TechForge here.

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Paul O’Sullivan, Senior Vice President of Solution Engineering (UKI) at Salesforce, sheds light on the complexities of this transformative landscape, urging businesses to tread cautiously while embracing the potential of artificial intelligence.

Unprecedented opportunities

Generative AI has stormed the scene with remarkable speed. ChatGPT, for example, amassed 100 million users in a mere two months.

“If you put that into context, it took 10 years to reach 100 million users on Netflix,” says O’Sullivan.

This rapid adoption signals a seismic shift, promising substantial economic growth. O’Sullivan estimates that generative AI has the potential to contribute a staggering £3.5 trillion ($4.4 trillion) to the global economy.

“Again, if you put that into context, that’s about as much tax as the entire US takes in,” adds O’Sullivan.

One of its key advantages lies in driving automation, with the prospect of automating up to 40 percent of the average workday—leading to significant productivity gains for businesses.

The AI trust gap

However, amid the excitement, there looms a significant challenge: the AI trust gap. 

O’Sullivan acknowledges that despite being a top priority for C-suite executives, over half of customers remain sceptical about the safety and security of AI applications.

Addressing this gap will require a multi-faceted approach including grappling with issues related to data quality and ensuring that AI systems are built on reliable, unbiased, and representative datasets. 

“Companies have struggled with data quality and data hygiene. So that’s a key area of focus,” explains O’Sullivan.

Safeguarding data privacy is also paramount, with stringent measures needed to prevent the misuse of sensitive customer information.

“Both customers and businesses are worried about data privacy—we can’t let large language models store and learn from sensitive customer data,” says O’Sullivan. “Over half of customers and their customers don’t believe AI is safe and secure today.”

Ethical considerations

AI also prompts ethical considerations. Concerns about hallucinations – where AI systems generate inaccurate or misleading information – must be addressed meticulously.

Businesses must confront biases and toxicities embedded in AI algorithms, ensuring fairness and inclusivity. Striking a balance between innovation and ethical responsibility is pivotal to gaining customer trust.

“A trustworthy AI should consistently meet expectations, adhere to commitments, and create a sense of dependability within the organisation,” explains O’Sullivan. “It’s crucial to address the limitations and the potential risks. We’ve got to be open here and lead with integrity.”

As businesses embrace AI, upskilling the workforce will also be imperative.

O’Sullivan advocates for a proactive approach, encouraging employees to master the art of prompt writing. Crafting effective prompts is vital, enabling faster and more accurate interactions with AI systems and enhancing productivity across various tasks.

Moreover, understanding AI lingo is essential to foster open conversations and enable informed decision-making within organisations.

A collaborative future

Crucially, O’Sullivan emphasises a collaborative future where AI serves as a co-pilot rather than a replacement for human expertise.

“AI, for now, lacks cognitive capability like empathy, reasoning, emotional intelligence, and ethics—and these are absolutely critical business skills that humans need to bring to the table,” says O’Sullivan.

This collaboration fosters a sense of trust, as humans act as a check and balance to ensure the responsible use of AI technology.

By addressing the AI trust gap, upskilling the workforce, and fostering a harmonious collaboration between humans and AI, businesses can harness the full potential of generative AI while building trust and confidence among customers.

You can watch our full interview with Paul O’Sullivan below:

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Shark attacks are, fortunately, quite rare. However, they do happen and most cases are either fatal or cause life-changing injuries.

Just last week, a fatal shark attack in Australia marked the eighth of the year—an almost 100-year record for the highest annual death toll. Once rare sightings in Southern California beaches are now becoming increasingly common as sharks are preferring the warmer waters close to shore.

Academics from the University of California and San Diego State University have teamed up with AI researchers from Salesforce to create software which can spot when sharks are swimming around popular beach destinations.

Sharks are currently tracked – when at all – by either keeping tabs of tagged animals online or by someone on a paddleboard keeping an eye out. It’s an inefficient system ripe for some AI innovation.

SharkEye uses drones to spot sharks from above. The drones fly preprogrammed paths at a height of around 120 feet to cover large areas of the ocean while preventing marine life from being disturbed.

If a shark is spotted, a message can be sent instantly to people including lifeguards, surf instructors, and beachside homeowners to take necessary action. Future alerts could also be sent directly to beachgoers who’ve signed up for them or pushed via social channels.

The drone footage is helping to feed further research into movement patterns. The researchers hope that by combining with data like ocean temperature, and the movement of other marine life, an AI will be able to predict when and where sharks are most likely to be in areas which may pose a danger to people.

SharkEye is still considered to be in its pilot stage but has been tested for the past two summers at Padaro Beach in Santa Barbara County.

A shark is suspected to have bitten a woman at Padaro Beach over summer when the team wasn’t flying a drone due to the coronavirus shutdown. Fortunately, her injuries were minor. However, a 26-year-old man was killed in a shark attack a few hours north in Santa Cruz just eight days later.

Attacks can lead to sharks also being killed or injured in a bid to save human life. Using AI to help find safer ways for sharks and humans to share the water can only be a good thing.

(Photo by Laura College on Unsplash)

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