85% of the C-Suite Say Their AI Tech Stacks Are Disconnected
Key Highlights
- ➤85% of enterprises lack systems connecting their average 183 AI tools
- ➤Three in five executives say AI tool proliferation has stalled strategic execution
- ➤Only 15% of AI investments operate as unified systems with shared intelligence
- ➤Two-thirds of organizations routinely uncover redundant AI investments
- ➤78% report customer-facing channels lack unified data models and brand architecture
Expert Statements
Dan Gardner, Co-Founder of Code and Theory
“What business leaders are experiencing now feels very different from the early promise of AI. AI hasn't proven it can autonomously achieve value on its own. Businesses are struggling to connect the people, systems and data around it. What they are missing is an orchestration layer. Once that layer is in place, the opportunity expands from individual efficiency to unlocking value across the entire business.”
NEW YORK, NY / ACCESS Newswire / October 7, 2026 / As AI adoption explodes, enterprises are stumbling in their efforts to demonstrate a material return on investment, according to a new report from WSJ Intelligence and Code and Theory, a Stagwell (NASDAQ:STGW) agency. Enterprises now have an average of 183 AI tools. Yet the vast majority (85%) don't have the systems to connect their tech, despite 94% of respondents saying that better orchestration of tools is essential to growth.
These are the key findings from a new study of 801 C-suite executives at U.S. companies with at least $500 million in annual revenue. The results point to what the report defines as "the orchestration gap," a widening distance between deploying AI and operating as a connected, agentic enterprise.
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