Artificial intelligence (AI) is transforming businesses of all sizes and giving them a competitive edge if they can figure out how to fund the transformation. While AI adoption is imperative for competitiveness, small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) face constraints including limited budgets and talent shortages that curb implementation. Telecom and technology audits uniquely empower SMBs to smash through these barriers and participate in the AI future.
AI delivers transformative potential for SMBs across key business functions. Research shows AI adoption enables them to boost efficiency, decision-making, customer experiences, and more. Specifically, traditional and generative AI tools empower SMBs in five critical ways:
While AI delivers tremendous potential, successfully unleashing its benefits requires modernized infrastructure as the essential foundation.
AI success depends heavily on modernized, high-performing infrastructure. A recent survey found that 91% of organizations believe their IT infrastructure needs improvement to support their AI goals.
Key infrastructure components — like secure computing, cloud storage, and networking — must scale on demand, enable real-time processing, ensure reliable data flows, optimize costs, and provide end-to-end security.
Attempting ambitious AI with outdated legacy systems will severely hamper outcomes, such as data and integration roadblocks that affect ROI.
Specifically, the cloud is imperative for AI tools to operate efficiently. Cloud computing provides the necessary tools and infrastructure for AI applications to operate, offering unparalleled power to tackle increasingly sophisticated challenges.
Benefits from cloud-powered AI include analyzing data quickly, always accessing consistent data to make good predictions, locking down sensitive information, and keeping costs in check to see returns. As the future of cloud computing is expected to be redefined by AI, the integration of AI and the cloud will continue to shape SMB operations in the years to come.
For today and tomorrow, attempting ambitious AI with outdated legacy systems will severely hamper outcomes, such as data and integration roadblocks that affect ROI.
Legacy systems often store data in isolated silos that cannot be easily integrated with modern systems, which could restrict data flow and analytics and prevent timely decision-making and competitiveness. Additionally, legacy systems’ outdated security features make them vulnerable targets for cyber threats, leading to potential breaches and data loss that severely affect ROI and operations.
Performance and efficiency also deteriorate over time with aging legacy systems, reducing productivity and revenue. In addition, lost revenue from hidden overcharges in legacy contracts is a reality, with proprietary data research showing businesses spend up to 20% of their tech budgets on telecom contracts or tech they rarely use.
Legacy contracts often have outdated terms and billing structures that lead to overlooked overcharges over time. Complex legacy agreements can mask fees like:
Further complicating the matter is limited visibility into actual usage data and spending, which makes it difficult for organizations to validate fees against services received.
Tech audits shine a light into legacy contract dark corners to uncover surprising savings that can fuel innovative transformation.
By optimizing telecom and technology agreements to identify wasteful spending, organizations can redirect significant portions of IT budgets into emerging capabilities like AI, automation, and engineering talent. Simply put, shining a light into legacy contract dark corners uncovers surprising savings that can fuel innovative transformation.
Capital freed from eliminating wasteful legacy spending can be reinvested to fund AI training, pilots, and rollouts. Further, the ongoing cost control from contract optimizations provides an increased budget to extend into full AI rollouts across an organization. As legacy agreements are continually streamlined, the savings compound to support expanding AI to additional functions and business units.
Optimized infrastructure from comprehensive technology audits paves the way for smoother AI integration in three ways:
As legacy contracts are continually optimized through recurring audits, wasteful overspending is systematically eliminated. The compounding savings then fund the expansion of initial AI pilots into larger deployments across the business, steering more budgets from outdated technologies into advanced analytics and automation.
Rather than a one-time initiative, integrating repeat audit services sustains cost governance as systems and agreements evolve, uncovering new savings opportunities. These savings allow organizations to bankroll innovation transformation without seeking additional budget increases. Currently, SpyGlass recommends a repeat audit two years after the completion of the prior audit.
Overall, keeping a regular audit on the schedule as an internal consulting partner governs spending and liberates capital for continuous reinvestment into AI capabilities is the key to driving growth and competitiveness.
The takeaway for SMBs is clear: comprehensive tech audits lay the groundwork for AI by optimizing infrastructure and freeing up capital. Investing audit savings into AI tools unlocks lasting competitive potential. Through comprehensive audits, SpyGlass uncovers redundancies and savings in 99% of engagements. SpyGlass SnapShot Audits build inventory, identify billing errors, and optimize contracts for 20%+ annual savings.
Now is the time for SMBs to audit for AI readiness. SpyGlass makes it simple and risk-free to start. Contact SpyGlass for a no-obligation Snapshot Audit to kick-start your organization’s AI future today.
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