More Companies Turning To Open-Source AI Tools To Unlock ROI: IBM Study

Organisations are investing in artificial intelligence for the long term, with a growing interest in using open-source tools to drive returns on investment and innovation, new research commissioned by IBM has found.

The study covering over 2,400 IT decision-makers said 85% respondents reported making progress in executing their 2024 AI strategy, with 47% already seeing positive ROI from their AI investments. The data also reflected open-source tools for AI solutions offering financial viability: 51% companies surveyed that utilised open-source AI tools reported seeing positive ROI, as compared to 41% of those not using open source.

Nearly two-thirds (62%) of respondents indicated they would increase their AI investments in 2025, while 48% were planning to leverage open-source ecosystems to optimise their AI implementations. 

Around 89% of surveyed organisations are planning to either increase or maintain their investment in AI in 2025. Of the 62% that plan to increase their investment, 39% plan to up their spending by 25-50%. Only 5% of respondents plan to decrease their AI spending.          

AI investments are being allocated towards: IT operations (top focus area for 63% of respondents), data quality management (46%), and product/services innovation (41%).

Surveyed ITDMs identified using managed cloud services (51%), hiring specialised talent (48%) and utilising open source (48%) among the most common ways they planned to optimise their AI investments.

Six in ten ITDMs surveyed reported using open-source ecosystems as an AI tool source, and more open-source AI solutions are expected in the coming year (41% in 2025 vs. 37% in 2024).

More than 80% of respondents said that at least a quarter of their AI solutions or platforms are based on open source. Surveyed companies utilising open-source ecosystems are more likely to be achieving positive ROI than those that are not (51% vs. 41%).

Around 85% of ITDMs reported making progress in executing their AI strategy, while only 9% reported no progress. Over three in 10 companies said their AI investments were driven more by innovation, compared to 28% that were more ROI-driven; 41% were equally innovation and ROI-driven.

Faster software development (25%), rapid innovation (23%), and productivity time savings (22%) ranked as the three most important metrics to calculate ROI from AI investments. 

Nearly half (47%) of the companies said they were achieving positive ROI from their AI projects; 33% said they were breaking even, and just 14% said they were recording negative ROI. Among companies not yet achieving positive ROI, 92% believe they would have positive ROI within three years.