Small businesses should be a much bigger part of the ‘AI transformation’ conversation

Welcome to AI Decoded , Fast Company ’s weekly newsletter that breaks down the most important news in the world of AI . You can sign up to receive this newsletter every week via email here . A look at the AI landscape for small businesses So much of the conversation around the great AI transformation of business has centered on enterprises, meaning companies with more than 500 employees. That makes sense: For AI and cloud companies, landing a large enterprise customer can mean securing a significant stream of recurring revenue. But if we’re really talking about AI reinventing work and making everyone more productive , small and medium-sized businesses should be a much bigger part of the conversation. According to the Small Business Administration, around 36 million small businesses operate in the U.S., employing 46% of private-sector workers. Most of those companies are very small. Federal data shows that about 88% have fewer than 20 employees. Universities and consultancies have, of c