Nearly 40% of Texas businesses use AI, per Fed survey

Data: UMD-LinkUp AIMaps; Note: "AI job" defined as a job requiring technical skills to build and/or use AI models. A bigger circle indicates more new jobs per capita. Map: Kavya Beheraj/Axios

Nearly 40% of Texas companies use artificial intelligence, and another 17% are planning to incorporate it into their businesses in the coming year, per a survey conducted by the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas.

Why it matters: The findings show how companies are approaching AI and how they're weighing its benefits and risks.

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Context: The Fed's April survey asked questions about traditional AI, which includes programs that can perform tasks using a set of rules, and generative AI, which autonomously generates new content.

• Around 360 business executives answered.

What they found: 13% of Texas companies report using traditional AI only and 6% use generative AI only. Some 14% use both and 6% said they use AI but didn't know which type.

• Half of the roughly 192 companies that use AI or plan to use it over the next year said they use it for marketing and advertising, with 45% using it for business analysis and predictive analytics.
• Texas companies also use AI for customer service, cybersecurity and fraud detection.

Of note: Most of the companies interested in AI pointed to increased productivity as one of the benefits.

The other side: Misinformation and privacy were the executives' top concerns for using AI.

Meanwhile: Texas and the Washington, D.C. metro area are emerging as strong second-tier contenders to Silicon Valley and Seattle for America's AI workforce.

• Dallas-Fort Worth is an AI job hot spot, with 15.3 new AI jobs per 100,000 residents. The national average is 11.7 new AI jobs.

Yes, but: The Dallas metro is among 25 metros most at risk of AI-related job losses. An analysis estimated that the region could lose 13% of its jobs to artificial intelligence.

The bottom line: More than half of Texas firms using AI said they don't anticipate it affecting their need for workers.

• About 14% said using AI changed the type of workers they need but not the overall number.