Relevance and Adoption of AI technologies in German SMEs – Results from Survey-Based Research

Abstract Artificial intelligence (AI) is regarded worldwide as one of the most important technologies of the future. In the international context, Germany is not considered a pioneer in the field of AI, and the implementation of AI technologies in German companies is also rather slow. Since the German economy is mainly driven by SMEs, the implementation of AI in SMEs is a key success factor of the national economy. It is known from general studies on digitalization that German SMEs are rather skeptical about new technologies. This paper discusses the implementation prospects of AI in German SMEs based on an empirical survey conducted in 2020 among 283 companies. It shows that the SMEs surveyed tend to use more traditional technologies such as rule-based systems and see the lack of employee qualifications in particular as an implementation hurdle.