We’re coming up to almost two years since the first episode of The CIO Show, which was a two part series discussing how Australian organisations were progressing with artificial intelligence. The scorecard was less than glowing, with much lower confidence and greater fear than most other developed economies. Fear arising both from perceptions of AI as something super complex and other worldly, and from the rising chorus of voices concerned that the ‘machines were coming’ and jobs, life as we know it was under threat, all amid a seeming torrent of ethical and legal challenges – real and imagined. On the other end of the spectrum, many organisations still viewed AI as some sort of panacea, increasing pressure on tech leaders to deploy solutions that had it written on the tin, with inevitable disappointing results. Lack of consultation and buy from the c-suite and wider workforce was among many other problems cited as impeding the progress of AI across Australian enterprises. So where are we now? Joining us to try and answer this far-from simple question is Michael Ciavarella, former CIO with Swimming Australia and now CTO with online fashion retailer, A&S Labels, Professor Michael Blumenstein, Deputy Dean research and innovation with the University of Technology, and Louise Francis, ANZ country manager and research director with IDC.