Stamford, Jan 21 (IANS): Given the level of ease and convenience that Artificial Intelligence (AI) brings with its implementation and use, the number of organisations that adopted AI in some way or the other globally has risen from 25 per cent in 2018 to 37 per cent today, global market research firm Gartner said on Monday.

The deployment of AI has tripled in the past year with 52 per cent of telco organisations deploying chatbots and 38 per cent of healthcare providers relying on computer-assisted diagnostics.

"Four years ago, AI implementation was rare, only 10 per cent of survey respondents reported that their organisations had deployed AI or would do so shortly. For 2019, that number has leapt to 37 per cent - a 270 per cent increase in four years," said Chris Howard, Research Vice President at Gartner.

The survey that was conducted to help Chief Information Officers (CIOs) and other IT leaders to set management agendas for 2019 showed that organisations across all industries use AI in a variety of applications.

"We still remain far from general AI that can wholly take over complex tasks, but we have now entered the realm of AI-augmented work and decision science - what we call ‘augmented intelligence,'" Howard added.

However, 54 per cent of respondents to the survey viewed skill shortage as the biggest challenge facing their organisation.

" If there is no AI talent available, another possibility is to invest in training programmes for employees with backgrounds in statistics and data management. Some organisations also create job shares with ecosystem and business partners," Howard said.

Now that AI capabilities have matured significantly in the last four years, implementation of AI by various companies around the world has grown by 270 per cent.