Since coming into force in 2024, the EU AI Act is now being rolled-out across member states from August 2026, marking a landscape shift in AI governance and providing businesses with an opportunity to lead the way in compliance.
For business leaders and investors, engagement with the EU AI Act demonstrates a useful signal of governance maturity, operational readiness, and long-term resilience.
A new analysis of the world’s largest dataset on corporate AI use, from the Thomson Reuters Foundation, samples nearly 3,000 global companies and shows that the EU AI Act is already generating a global ripple effect.
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Why is this important for the private sector?
With AI continuously developing faster than the rules designed to govern it, the private sector is grappling with leveraging the business opportunities presented by AI while also trying to manage it responsibly. This is creating a growing transparency gap and increasing risks for businesses, workers, investors and society
The EU AI Act marks the first and most comprehensive regulation on Artificial Intelligence. Despite only coming into effect in August 2026, the Thomson Reuters Foundation’s research shows that the Act is causing a Brussels Effect, by already influencing corporate AI governance beyond Europe and demonstrating the tendency of EU regulation to become a global standard.
New Thomson Reuters Foundation research
The Global Impact of the EU AI Act, based on AI Company Data Initiative (AICDI) findings, reveals striking trends in compliance.
While regulation can bring consensus around AI risk, accountability and trust, a comprehensive picture of how AI is being adopted and managed by companies is crucial to understanding how this works in practice and to mitigate associated risks.
What is the AICDI and how can I get involved?
The AI Company Data Initiative (AICDI) is the world’s largest dataset on corporate AI adoption, comprising public data and disclosures to inform responsible business decisions worldwide
Take part in the AI Company Data Initiative to future-proof your business against potential risks and discover a roadmap to best practice. Access our AICDI response platform to benchmark your company or find anonymised 2025 data on AI governance matters to discover trends and insights.
The report includes sector-by-sector and regional trends, as well as global findings across five themes: strategy, oversight, workforce, ethics and environment and data governance.
Companies that respond before 27 November 2026 have the chance to be listed as a responder for 2026 AICDI, demonstrating governance expertise to key stakeholders.
Don’t Get Left Behind: Navigating the EU AI Act with the AICDI
Don’t miss out on industry-leading commentary on how key players are responding to the policy change.
Our investor webinar, Don’t Get Left Behind: Navigating the EU AI Act with the AICDI, reveals the Brussel effect in the responsible AI field for companies deploying, buying or building AI.
Join the discussion, alongside business leaders, on 28 July 2026 at 2pm BST
How are businesses responding to the upcoming EU AI Act roll out?
Our research found that nearly 90% of companies have not publicly committed to any named AI governance framework, while just 7% of companies conduct human rights impact assessments. Governance gaps pose regulatory and investment risks, with limited visibility of how companies’ use of AI may have ethical impacts on people and society.
For business leaders and investors, alignment with the EU AI Act is increasingly a useful sign of governance maturity, operational readiness and long-term resilience.. The Act’s influence has pre-dated the roll-out, providing companies with a standardised framework to follow amid a fragmented landscape.
Find out how your company can stay ahead of the curve in EU AI Act compliance using our five-step checklist.
What are policy makers trying to achieve with this change?
The August 2026 deadline is an immediate pressure point, and the stakes are high for non-compliance. First enforcement measures are already in effect as of December 2025, with high-risk system obligations effective from August 2026.
But what does responsible AI governance look like in practice, and how far do most companies still have to go?
On 23 June 2026 in Brussels, the Thomson Reuters Foundation brought together Members of the European Parliament (MEPs), corporate leaders, asset managers and civil society representatives at the European Parliament.
The event, ‘Beyond Compliance: From Principles to Practice in Corporate AI Governance’, was co-hosted by Foundation CEO Antonio Zappulla and MEP Brando Benifei, the co-rapporteur of the EU AI Act, with industry voices from Siemens, Vodafone and Amundi among the participants.
What emerged from this candid conversation was a picture of a regulatory moment at a crossroads: one framework increasingly shaping global norms and a significant gap between the policies companies are writing and the practices they are implementing. Read our summary linked below for more on this.
You can find more analysis on Brussels Times from Antonio Zappulla with his take on the question, Is the EU AI Act reviving the Brussels Effect?
As the window for building a governance record ahead of regulatory pressure narrows, we are hearing increasingly positive signals from more companies about how they are working on adopting a more responsible AI framework.
Conversations with sector leaders at the European Parliament launch of the Act confirmed our findings that the EU AI Act is already the global default when it comes to responsible AI governance.
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Contact our expert AICDI team for more information.
