Slow industries reward their early movers. Overall, chemical distribution is moving slow on AI with some moving faster than others.
AI got no session at the ACD Spring Regional Meeting in Cleveland and barely came up. Careful adoption makes sense here, and the distributors who apply AI to one process this year will spend less and learn faster than those who start in 2027.
I spent Monday and Tuesday at the ACD Spring Regional Meeting in Cleveland. Good sessions on sustainability, media training, operations, cyber and industry updates to a room full of people who make this industry work. However, AI did not get a session, and it barely came up in conversation. That surprised me, because roughly 8 in 10 chemical executives now call AI critical to their future while fewer than half of their companies have an enterprise plan for it.
Our industry adopts technology carefully, and for good reason: regulations, safety, and data security leave little room for error. But careful adoption and no adoption are different decisions with different price tags.
The distributors who pick one process and apply AI to it this year will spend less and learn faster than the ones who start in 2027.
If not now, when?