Local businesses account for the majority of commerce and employment in Canada. These small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), particularly those outside technology sectors, are considering adopting AI but may be unsure how to begin.1 Where does AI fit within their unique business processes? How much will it impact their bottom lines and workers?
Signal49 Research, in partnership with the Future Skills Centre, is developing a decision support tool to help SMEs explore potential use cases for adopting AI and its impact on their business outcomes. We will equip them with a systematic framework to address these common questions:
- How are businesses in my industry leveraging AI?
- Which use cases provide the most potential for my business?
- What capabilities would my workforce need?
Supporting small business with informed examples
SMEs drive a major share of Canada’s economy, but lagging AI adoption can widen productivity and competitiveness gaps.2 Our research on how organizations are adopting automation technology forecasts an increase in productivity across all sectors of up to 13.8 per cent (with AI accounting for a large share of these gains) over the next 15 years.3 But poorly executed adoption would have a negative overall effect, risking lower competitiveness, trust, and investment among Canadian SMEs.
When we spoke with businesses and SME‑serving organizations, we heard consistent messages:
- AI feels abstract: While there are many general use cases, sector-specific information is hard to find.
- The benefits are unclear: SME owners don’t know which use cases will show the highest returns on investment.
- Workforce impact remains uncertain: SME owners need clear information on AI’s capacity to automate or augment tasks, potentially leading to changing skills and roles.
SMEs pursuing this path can benefit from clear, practical insights into where AI can create operational value, how it connects to their sector, and the internal capabilities required to adopt it effectively.
Practical pathways to AI adoption
Our web-based tool will support SMEs early in their journey to help them make AI-adoption decisions.
This tool will provide SMEs with structured insight into:
- sector-specific AI use cases that are relevant to their core business activities
- the scale of productivity improvements associated with different AI applications
- the implications of adoption for workforce structure, role evolution, and skills development.
Get involved
To learn more about this project or to participate in an interview or request early access, please contact our team.
- Statistics Canada, Table 33-10-1045-01, “Use of artificial intelligence (AI) by businesses or organizations in producing goods or delivering services over the next 12 months, third quarter of 2025,” August 27, 2025.
- Alex Greco, “Bridging the Adoption Gap: The Key to Turning Canada’s Productivity Around,” Canadian Chamber of Commerce (blog), February 2, 2026.
- The Conference Board of Canada, The Productivity Potential of Automation Technologies, Ottawa: CBoC, 2025.
FSC partners
The responsibility for the findings and conclusions of this research rests entirely with Signal49 Research.