Trustworthy AI practices linked to 15 times higher likelihood of strong ROI, SAS study finds

Organisations that adopt trustworthy artificial intelligence practices are 15 times more likely to report strong or high returns on investment (ROI) from their AI projects, according to a new report from SAS based on research by IDC.

The findings, published in the second annual Data and AI Impact Report: The New Economics of Trust, highlight the growing importance of governance, data quality, explainability and auditability as organisations expand their use of AI.

According to the study, 62% of organisations with trustworthy AI practices reported strong or high ROI, compared with 4% among organisations without the same level of practices.

Employees frequently override AI decisions

The research also identified a challenge for organisations deploying increasingly autonomous AI systems: employees often override AI-generated recommendations when they do not understand the reasoning behind a decision.

Overall, 97.2% of users surveyed said they override AI recommendations in at least some situations.

The leading reason for an override, regardless of whether the recommendation was considered correct, was the AI system's inability to explain how it reached its decision.

In the UAE, insufficient explanation was cited as the leading reason for overriding AI recommendations by 41.1% of respondents.

The report also found that trust declined from 76% for generative AI to 66% for agentic AI, reflecting concerns associated with AI systems taking on greater levels of autonomy.

Bryan Harris, CTO at SAS, said organisations need to combine AI capabilities with domain expertise and human oversight, particularly when deploying AI in high-stakes environments.

Chris Marshall, Vice President at IDC, said stronger oversight, explainability, accountability and data foundations were becoming increasingly important as organisations sought to scale AI.

UAE records sharp rise in AI trustworthiness

The UAE recorded one of the largest improvements in the study's AI Trustworthiness Index, rising by 30.2 points to 65.7 in 2026 and moving above the global benchmark.

Michel Ghorayeb, Managing Director of SAS UAE, attributed the progress to the rapid adoption of AI governance across government and private-sector organisations.

The findings also indicate that data quality and governance have become the leading reliability priority among UAE organisations, reaching 62.2% in 2026.

However, only 13.5% of UAE organisations surveyed said they mandate data-quality processes for every AI project, pointing to a gap between recognising the importance of data quality and applying controls consistently.

Strong data foundations linked to higher AI returns

The report found that only 17.5% of enterprises have a fully optimised data infrastructure considered mature enough to support the demands of agentic AI.

Organisations with an optimised data foundation were four times more likely to expect strong ROI from AI projects. They were also six times more likely to mandate data-quality and explainability controls.

The research suggests that the quality of the underlying data infrastructure can affect both the reliability of AI systems and an organisation's ability to govern their use.

Trustworthy AI linked to wider business gains

Beyond direct ROI, organisations with the strongest trustworthy AI practices reported 1.85 times greater gains across 13 business outcomes, including revenue growth, cost savings and customer experience.

The report also found that 85% of AI-leading organisations with trustworthy AI practices are increasing their investment in the area by more than 10% this year.

The findings suggest that organisations achieving greater value from AI may differ less in the technologies they deploy than in how they govern, manage and integrate those technologies into their operations.

Findings span four industries

The research is based on a global survey of 2,699 decision-makers with knowledge of or influence over their organisations' data and AI initiatives. Respondents came from 28 countries and four industries: banking, insurance, life sciences and the public sector.

Among the sector-specific findings, 85% of AI-leading banks had established AI governance frameworks, compared with 29% of organisations classified as laggards.

In the public sector, 41% of AI leaders said they planned to increase investment in trustworthy AI by more than 20% in the year ahead.

Life sciences recorded the highest proportion of organisations that had scaled AI across the company, at 23%.