A new Capgemini report on data-powered enterprises reveals a significant shift in how organisations leverage data to drive business goals.

With a global survey of 1,000 business and data executives, the research highlights how companies are increasingly embedding insights into core business processes and using proprietary data to enhance decision-making, unlock new revenue streams, and fuel innovation.

A key takeaway from the report is the rise of “data masters” – organisations that excel in both data foundations (infrastructure, tools, governance) and data behaviors (people, processes, culture).

In the UK, 17% of organisations qualify as data masters, reaping superior benefits across data operations, generative AI, business outcomes, and financial metrics. Notably, 83% of data masters have high effectiveness in monetising data, compared to just 61% of other organisations.

Data Monetisation and Business Impact

Capgemini’s findings demonstrate that organisations are increasingly capitalising on data as a valuable asset. For instance, Coca-Cola has put data at the centre of its growth strategies, leading to a 9% revenue increase in the first half of 2023.

The European data economy is another indicator of the monetisation potential of data. Valued at €301 billion (£355.51 billion) in 2018, it is projected to reach €829 billion (£703.74 billion) by 2025, contributing significantly to regional GDP—from 2% in 2018 to an estimated 6% by 2025.

Organisations are also making significant strides in improving their decision-making processes through data. In 2020, only 50% of executives described their internal decision-making as data-powered. By 2024, this number had increased to 60%. Furthermore, 65% of business executives report that their chief experience officer’s (CXOs) are actively using data-powered insights to drive business decisions.

Data activation – the process of embedding data and insights into core business processes alongside AI – has also seen considerable growth. In 2020, only 40% of organisations used activated data to introduce new products or develop new business models. By 2024, nearly two-thirds of executives report doing so.

However, only 42% of data executives report receiving the required data to train AI/generative AI models, indicating a need for improvement in data creation, collection, and management processes.

As the volume of global data is expected to nearly triple by 2025, with 80-90% of it being unstructured, the report states that organisations will need to focus on enhancing their data foundations to fully capitalise on the opportunities presented by generative AI and other data-driven innovations.

Strengthening Data Foundations

Capgemini’s report highlights the importance of robust data foundations for driving business success.

Since 2020, organisations have made significant progress in strengthening their infrastructure, tools, and platforms to support data-powered decision-making.

For instance, the percentage of organisations expanding data, business intelligence, and analytics in the cloud has increased from 51% in 2020 to 60% in 2024.

Similarly, investment in data analytics tools has surged, with 76% of organisations reporting investment in these tools, up from 54% in 2020.

Despite these improvements, foundational challenges remain. Identifying, creating, and collecting the right datasets continues to be an area of concern, particularly in the context of AI and generative AI models.

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Only 42% of data executives currently receive the necessary data to train these models, highlighting a gap that could hinder organisations’ ability to scale and productionize AI initiatives.

Data governance also remains a critical focus area. The report emphasises the need for a governance framework that ensures trust in data operations and supports innovations powered by data. This includes breaking down data silos, fostering a data-driven culture, and ensuring that data is findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable (FAIR).

Finally, the report notes a significant reduction in the number of “data laggards” – organisations that fail to lead in either data foundations or behaviors. In 2020, 71% of organisations fell into this category. By 2024, this number had dropped to 50%, indicating that more organizations are making progress in their journey toward data mastery.