75% of Chief Financial Officers Believe AI Will Drive Revenue, Says APAC Study
Buoyed by the performance of AI agents, Chief Financial Officers in the Asia Pacific region have shifted to support AI strategies in the workplace, according to a study by Salesforce.
Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) in the Asia Pacific region (APAC) have shifted from a conservative outlook on AI to become strategic investors in the new technology. This, according to a study by Salesforce, a worldwide customer relations management (CRM) company, marks a fundamental change where leadership of many APAC companies view AI as a crucial engine for long-term revenue growth.
The study revealed that 75% of APAC CFOs believe that AI agents will not only cut costs in their organization, but also drive revenue. At the same time, CFOs implementing AI agents say that they expect an increase in company revenue of almost 20%. In addition, 77% of APAC CFOs say AI agents will fundamentally transform their business model. More than half—58% of CFOs—foresee that AI agents will take on more strategic work in their companies.
Robin Washington, President and Chief Operating and Financial Officer at Salesforce, spoke about the implications of their study, saying, “The introduction of digital labor isn’t just a technical upgrade—it represents a decisive and strategic shift for CFOs. With AI agents, we’re not merely transforming business models; we’re fundamentally reshaping the entire scope of the CFO function. This demands a new mindset as we expand beyond financial stewards to also become architects of agentic enterprise value.”
In the Salesforce study, researchers conducted a double-blind online survey in partnership with Morning Consult. They surveyed 261 CFOs from 24 countries. In APAC, 60 respondents were surveyed from Australia, India, Japan, New Zealand, Singapore, and South Korea.
From Conservative to Aggressive AI Strategies
Today’s support of AI from Chief Financial Officers marks a dramatic shift in strategy. Five years ago, 63% of CFOs in APAC adhered to a conservative AI strategy. This number dropped to 33% two years ago, while now only 3% of CFOs remain conservative.
Replacing this conservative outlook is a bullish attitude that AI will lead to future revenue growth with a third of APAC CFO’s adopting an “aggressive” AI strategy.
The Rise of AI Agents and Digital Labor
One contributor to this turning point is the adoption of AI agents. Sixty-two percent of APAC CFOs say AI agents/digital labor is changing their perspective on how their business spends money. The surveyed CFOs self-reported that they are allocating, on the average, 23% of their total AI budgets to AI agents.
The ability of AI agents to reduce costs and boost revenue has hastened AI adoption across the region. Sixty percent of APAC CFOs say AI agents are critical for competition in today’s economic environment.
CFOs view AI as a way to ensure ROI through better financial control. “AI provides real-time budget tracking, which improves forecasting accuracy and helps protect ROI from overspending through better financial control,” said one respondent.
For the region’s CFOs, AI and AI agents have proven valuable in decision-making, efficiency, and cost savings or avoidance.
According to one of the CFO respondents, “Traditional technology investments mainly focus on immediate financial returns that can be easily visible, but AI benefits are a mix of long- and short-term duration. KPIs are focused based on business outcomes.”
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