Driving Business Value and ROI for AI CoEs
Redefining Mission Statement & Sourcing 30 Internal Projects so Compelling, that Business Stakeholders were Willing to Fund Them
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Situation: A global top 10 pharmaceutical company was in the early stages of launching an AI Center of Excellence (CoE), with the goal of accelerating the adoption of artificial intelligence across the organization. However, the initiative lacked a clearly defined purpose, strategic direction, and business integration — raising concerns that the CoE would become a cost center with limited real-world impact.
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Action:
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Assisted client with design and positioning of the CoE, with a focus on embedding business value from day one.
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Defining the Vision & Purpose
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Developed a clear and compelling mission statement for the CoE that emphasized delivering measurable value to internal business stakeholders, rather than pursuing AI for its own sake.
Business Stakeholder Buy-in & Use Case Development
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Proactively engaged with business units across the organization to source 30 real, high-impact business problems that the CoE could solve using AI/ML.
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Focused on use cases that were pressing enough that stakeholders were willing to co-fund AI initiatives, converting the CoE from a traditional cost center into a revenue-generating asset for the Chief Data Office (CDO).
Strategic Expansion
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Due to the success of the CoE strategy, project was expanded to include the development of a broader AI/ML strategy and implementation roadmap to support improvements in internal corporate functions, beyond R&D, including HR.
Our Strategic Impact
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Transformed the AI CoE from a conceptual innovation lab into a business-aligned engine for value creation, with a pipeline of 30 stakeholder-backed use cases with internal funding.
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Positioned the CDO’s office and its AI lab as a strategic enabler, not just a supportive IT function, by demonstrating how AI and the CDO’s department could solve concrete business problems.