Leadership Vision 2026: R&D Priorities in the AI Era

In 2026 and beyond, the greatest opportunity for organizations to capture value from AI lies in accelerating front‑end innovation — the upstream activities that generate new ideas, intellectual property and market differentiation. Yet R&D leaders cite rising cost pressures and a scarcity of critical AI skills as the top risks to achieving their strategic goals.

To deliver high‑impact innovation in a resource‑constrained environment, R&D leaders must conduct an activity audit to eliminate low‑value work and redeploy capacity toward foundational initiatives that create long‑term strategic advantage. Success in 2026 will require enabling sustainable growth, smartly optimizing costs and unlocking AI’s impact on the innovation lifecycle.

This interactive webinar outlines the three areas where R&D leaders must concentrate their attention: increasing influence with the C‑suite, treating AI as a digital colleague and addressing the root causes of process inefficiency.

• Understand that influence, not innovation alone, is the currency of growth. Position R&D as the “chief future officer” through continuous foresight and leadership on return‑on‑the‑future initiatives.

• Treat AI as a digital colleague and evaluate AI investments across multiple dimensions of return, including return on employee, return on investment and return on the future.

• Deploy a cost‑optimization framework and proactively manage the R&D portfolio to focus time, talent and resources on the highest‑value initiatives supporting both near‑term and long‑term growth.
  
  

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