New Report: Women Entrepreneurs Adopt AI at Scale - But the Benefits are Uneven

9th March 2026

The Cherie Blair Foundation for Women has published a new report, Adopted not embedded: AI, productivity and uneven gains for women entrepreneurs, in partnership with Intuit and the World Bank's Women, Business and the Law project, and with support from the Team Lewis Foundation.

Across 66 low- and middle-income countries, 82% of surveyed women entrepreneurs now use AI in their businesses, up from just 38% a year ago. Yet adoption is not the same as impact. Women who integrate AI into back-end functions — finance, inventory and operations — are nearly twice as likely to report revenue growth as those using it only for marketing. Fewer than a third currently do so.

What holds women back is a lack of skills, confidence, and time to experiment. The report calls on policymakers to invest in practical, function-specific training and on technology companies to build tools designed for small-business realities: mobile-first, low-bandwidth, and reducing cognitive load rather than adding to it.

AI has the potential to be a genuine field leveller for women entrepreneurs — but only with the right support in place.

Read the full report at the Cherie Blair Foundation for Women website. Cherie also spoke to PA Media’s Anna Wise about the report, as well as recording a social media message.