The numbers at a glance
A lot is written about AI in SMBs, but the facts sometimes get buried under the hype. Here is a level-headed overview of where we really stand in 2026, based on CBS figures and the Exact SMB Barometer research.
In 2025, 17% of Dutch companies with at least two employees used at least one AI technology, a doubling compared to 2023. For companies with 10 to 50 employees that figure was 27%. For 50 to 250 employees, 45%. The growth is real, but the distribution is uneven.
At the same time, only 6% of SMBs feel that their company is currently sufficiently automated. 58% say they find it harder as an SMB to benefit quickly from new technologies. And 60% think that a lack of automation is the main reason SMBs miss out on opportunities.
Where it gets stuck
The barriers are concrete and understandable. 42% name a lack of time and people as the biggest obstacle. 36% struggle to free up budget. 27% lack specific technical knowledge.
This is not a matter of unwillingness. The appetite to innovate is there: 59% say that further automation is a priority. The problem is that SMB owners keep so many balls in the air that there is no room to take on one more, even if that ball would eventually make the others lighter.
There is a paradox in this: you have no time to automate, but precisely by not automating you have no time. The companies that break this cycle do so by starting small and getting results fast.
What Dutch SMBs do with AI
Among the companies that deploy AI, the most common applications are not spectacular. Marketing and sales come first: 33% of AI users at small companies use it there. Next come administrative processes and management tasks at 26%.
These are not futuristic use cases. They are the places where the workload is high and where relatively simple tools make an immediate difference. Categorising emails, generating standard replies, processing invoices, creating content. The gain is not in one revolutionary application but in removing dozens of small time-wasters.
The next step: from tools to system
What stands out is that most SMBs deploy AI as loose tools. A chatbot here, a content generator there. But the real value emerges when AI works not just in one corner of your company, but as a connecting layer on top of all your systems. That is the shift we see starting in 2026 among the companies that are furthest along.
No longer AI as an experiment, but AI as business infrastructure. That requires no enormous budget or a technical team. It requires a clear picture of where you stand and where the most value sits.
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