Research and development investment in artificial intelligence (AI) has grown by more than 140 percent over the past four years.
New data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), released today, shows business expenditure on Research & Development (R&D) grew by 18 percent to $24.4 billion in 2023-24.
ABS Head of Business Statistics Robert Ewing said the strongest growth in R&D was seen in the Information and computing sciences research field.
“This includes spending on Artificial Intelligence, or AI, which grew by 142 percent since 2021-2022,” Mr Ewing said.
“Businesses more than doubled their investment, putting $668.3 million into AI R&D in 2023-24, compared to $276.3 million in 2021-22. This shows how rapidly Australian firms have begun investing in AI.”
He said, however, it was Software engineering that made the largest contribution to the Information and computing sciences research field.
“This category grew by 26 percent to $4.9 billion.”
Mr Ewing said the Professional, scientific and technical services industry made up 38 percent of R&D expenditure in 2023-24, totalling $9.2 billion.
He said this was followed by the Manufacturing industry at 21 percent, or $5billion, with the Financial and insurance services industry the third highest at 14 percent, or $3.5 billion.
“Business spending on R&D kept pace with the growth of the overall economy, remaining at 0.9 percent of GDP for 2023-24.”
