Capgemini Research Institute has published its latest global reports, Navigating uncertainty with confidence – Investment priorities for 2025* and Top Tech Trends of 2025: AI-powered Everything, unveiling business priorities for investments and technology in the year ahead.
Capgemini’s investments trends report found that businesses remain positive about their organisation’s outlook despite ongoing uncertainty in the market environment, with 62% feeling optimistic about their organisation’s prospects for 2025. In spite of a cost containment imperative, this optimism is driving increased investment, notably in customer experience, supply chains, and sustainability. These initiatives are crucial to enabling more innovation, efficiency, competitiveness and resilience-building.
The report found business leaders are feeling more confident about the year ahead than they were 12 months ago – 62% are optimistic about their organisation’s prospects for 2025, up 6 percentage points on the same time last year and 20 since 2023. However, executives have more confidence in their own organisations than the global market at large, with 37% optimistic about the prospects for the global operating environment in the next 12-18 months, only slightly up on last year.
In the current market uncertainty, 56% expect to prioritise cost reductions over revenue growth for 2025. But executives know that this change requires investment – half say that their organisation plans to increase overall investment in 2025, with just under a quarter anticipating lower levels of investment compared to 2024, and the rest expecting no change.
“As we look to 2025, business leaders are navigating uncertainty with an attitude of confidence and resilience – two qualities that our research shows they are looking to instill in their organisations through technology investment,” said Aiman Ezzat, CEO, Capgemini.
“Technology has a key role to play to improve competitiveness and productivity, while reducing costs and making all-important efficiency gains. With a focus on innovation, supply chains and sustainability – which is increasingly being harnessed for its value-driving potential – leaders will set themselves up to succeed in an uncertain environment and build resilient, adaptable organisations. Crucially, this will help shape a more innovative, sustainable and inclusive global economy.”
Much of business leaders’ confidence continues to focus on customer experience, followed by engineering, research and development (R&D), and innovation - with nearly eight in 10 and nearly three quarters of executives now planning to increase investment in these areas, respectively.
However, the sharpest acceleration in investment is focused on supply chain transformation. This is where 63% say they will increase their spend in 2025 – up from less than half in 2024 – and by 9.4% on average. New-generation supply chains will integrate AI and the Internet of Things (IoT) to enhance efficiency, reduce waste, and support a business’s sustainability goals, as well as improve decision-making and reduce costs overall.
Globally, seven in 10 executives are concerned about the impact of rising tariffs and bilateral trade disputes on their organisation’s competitiveness. Almost two thirds are also concerned about the impact of a potential global trade war on their organisation’s operations and market access. On this front, executives in Japan and China are the most concerned about rising tariffs and bilateral trade disputes, and the least about a potential global trade war.
To mitigate these risks and build resilience, most organisations globally are diversifying their sourcing and/or friendshoring. Almost three in four executives are already de-risking their supply chains by investing in other emerging countries to reduce reliance on China, up from less than half last year. In parallel, almost two thirds of them now confirm that friendshoring will represent a significant part their organisation’s sourcing and production strategies in 2025 (up from 45% last year).
Sustainability investment is increasingly seen as a business value driver as well as an asset for compliance and efficiency, but a trend that is impacted by geopolitics. Capgemini's A world in balance 2024 report found that under a quarter (23%) of executives surveyed said that the
cost of sustainability investments outweigh the benefits, and over two
thirds agreed that anticipating or pre-empting stricter future
regulations is a key driver of sustainability initiatives,
up from 57% in 2023. Further, 64% of executives surveyed in
June-July 2024 agreed that the geopolitics of the time were an increasing
consideration in sustainability investments.
In the current investment report, 62% of executives (up 10 percentage points from 2024) are planning to increase their sustainability budgets, by 10.5% on average. The priority areas are climate tech (72% of executives planning to spend more), including hydrogen, renewables, batteries, nuclear, and carbon capture.
Batteries are seen as the top climate tech investment in 2025, with over half of business leaders ranking them in their top three, in particular manufacturers and automotive companies – followed by solar energy. Besides climate tech, the other top areas of increased investment in sustainability are sustainable R&D and product development, biodiversity protection and restoration, and water conservation/management.
Fifty-seven percent of business leaders in Singapore are optimistic about the outlook of their organisation, and 58% plan to increase their organisation's investments in 2025. AI is the top technology investment area in 2025 for 67% of businesses in Singapore. According to the Capgemini tech trends report:
- Three quarters of Singapore organisations are expected to begin proofs of concept (PoCs) or completely adopt AI agents.
- Over 60% of organisations in Singapore will deploy PoCs for AI/gen AI in cybersecurity in 2025.
- Almost one-quarter of organisations in Singapore will deploy partial scale AI-powered robots in 2025.
- Seven in 10 business leaders among large organisations in Singapore are planning to increase investments in sustainability. Six in 10 have plans to increase investments in climate tech.
- Fifty-seven percent of business leaders among large organisations in Singapore have plans to increase investments in the supply chain.
- More than half of the organisations (58%) are exploring new-generation supply chains in Singapore that are agile, greener and AI-assisted.
Globally, Singapore has the highest percentage of business leaders in large organisations who have plans to increase investments in customer experience (85%), and manufacturing/operations (72%).
When it comes to global tech trends, Capgemini’s findings highlight the critical need for businesses to leverage technology, specifically AI, as it empowers them to elevate efficiency and innovation, and adapt to unpredictable market conditions. The top tech trends for 2025 include:
Generative AI: from copilots to reasoning AI agents
Autonomous intelligent systems, capable of learning and adapting to new situations, are becoming more prevalent and valuable across various industries. Seven in 10 executives and 85% of investors (venture capital, private equity, and commercial banks) picked AI agents as a top-three technology by impact for 2025.
AI and generative (gen) AI in cybersecurity: new defences, new threats
AI is transforming cybersecurity as well as cyberthreats. Industry executives in the Capgemini survey ranked AI and gen AI in cybersecurity as the topmost trend out of more than 60 trends for 2025.
AI-driven robotics: blurring the line between human and machine
Industries are using collaborative robots – or cobots – and AI-driven robotics to enhance productivity and safety. As robots become more autonomous and AI takes on complex decision-making roles, the traditional structure of authority in the workplace may shift, Capgemini said.
AI: driving nuclear resurgence
With the growing need for clean, reliable power to meet the energy demands of AI and other high-energy technologies, nuclear energy is poised to play a crucial role in 2025 and beyond. Capgemini believes that 2025 will be an important year for the advancement of small modular reactors (SMRs).
New-generation supply chains
Faced with increasingly complex – and often unpredictable – market conditions, organisations are focusing on improving the efficiency, resilience, agility, circularity, and sustainability of their supply chains. Technologies like AI, data, Blockchain, the Internet of Things (IoT), and terrestrial-satellite network connectivity will all play a role in achieving improvements in global logistics.
*The Capgemini Research Institute surveyed 2,500 business leaders from 2,500 organisations across 17 countries in North America, Europe, and Asia-Pacific and included nine industries and sectors: automotive; consumer products; banking and capital markets; insurance; retail; life sciences; telecoms, media and high-tech; manufacturing; and energy and utilities. The survey took place from October 23 to November 20, 2024 - half of the sample as collected prior to the US elections, and half was collected after. Across the total sample, 70% of respondents are from organizations with more than US$1 B in annual revenue and 30% are mid-sized organisations with US$100 million to US$1 B in annual revenue.
