CEOs are clambering over one another to get a head start in the AI race. As their urgency increases, the CEO of Accenture has had to get used to a lot more long-haul trips.
Accenture beat investor estimates as it collected $17.7 billion in revenue in the first quarter of its 2025 fiscal year, sending shares up 7% on Thursday. The group banked $1.2 billion in AI bookings in the first quarter of 2024. Earnings also topped investors’ expectations at $2.3 billion for the quarter.
The tech giant’s CEO, Julie Sweet, was keen to talk up the fervent enthusiasm she had seen among CEOs as a sign the AI boom will last. Indeed, Accenture, which provides clients with technology solutions and helps develop AI platforms, has collected $4.2 billion in generative AI sales since September 2023.
Sweet told analysts on Thursday that she had spoken with 30 of her peers across Europe, Southeast Asia, Australia, and the U.S. in the past two months, perhaps downplaying the period by describing it as a “busy travel quarter.”
“And pretty consistently, clients are seeking to do more in AI, but they are in such different places,” said Sweet.
Sweet used the example of banking clients, with some ready to deploy AI across the cloud, while others are still trying to understand how the technology could be useful to them.
She added that CEOs are still operating in a tepid budgetary environment, with AI spending being prioritized or deprioritized rather than having a budget of its own.
“Where we see the biggest opportunity: when companies start to get more confident to spend more … and moving faster with their data foundation that fuels AI, and then AI. But right now it still generally feels more like a prioritization within current budgets.”
Accenture highlighted its range of partnerships with major companies, including Spotify and an unnamed aerospace group.
Bosses are working to roll out AI across their organizations, after many experimented with copilots and other small-scale use cases this year, in hopes the technology can yield a meaningful return on investment.
However, investors are growing concerned about the levels of capital expenditure in AI among the world’s biggest tech groups.
The Blue Whale Growth Fund, set up by British billionaire Peter Hargreaves, said it was “aggressively” selling shares in Magnificent Seven companies, highlighting Microsoft and Meta as businesses that would struggle to transform their AI spending into profit next year.
Sweet was also asked if she had any concerns about efficiency drives in the U.S. federal government under Donald Trump, a reference to Elon Musk’s new Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE). Musk has vowed to cut spending, regulations, and headcount in federal departments.
Accenture derives about 8% of its revenues from federal government clients. However, Sweet appeared confident that the group wouldn’t be affected by prospective spending cuts.
“The vast majority of what we do is mission critical to the federal government,” said Sweet. “So we see a real opportunity to continue to partner with the new administration, as we’ve partnered with all administrations, and also with all of the leaders in the federal government who every day are waking up to really drive those key things.”
