Turning AI Potential into Practical Progress

Explore the Breakout Sessions

The future of tax will be shaped by how organisations adopt AI, harness technology, build new capabilities and respond to an increasingly data-driven regulatory environment.

At KPMG's Make the Leap: Tax Technology & AI Summit, tax, technology and business leaders came together to explore the practical realities of that change. Across a series of breakout discussions, experts shared their perspectives on AI adoption, technology strategy, workforce transformation and the changing relationship between taxpayers and tax authorities.

Explore the key themes, practical recommendations and leadership insights from each session below.

Amar Thakrar

Partner, Tax Compliance & Transformation

KPMG in the UK

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Led by Chris Rogers, Partner, Global Compliance and Transformation, Tax & Legal, KPMG in the UK this breakout explored how organisations can move from AI ambition to measurable outcomes, focusing on practical use cases, business cases and delivering value at scale.

The challenge facing most tax leaders isn’t understanding AI. It’s making it real.

Across organisations, AI ambition is high but translating that into measurable outcomes remains a barrier. At the Make the Leap Summit, the “Make AI Happen” breakout focused on closing that gap: moving from isolated experiments to scalable, value-driven use cases.

Key message

AI success in tax doesn’t come from more ideas - it comes from disciplined execution across the full lifecycle: identifying the right use cases, prioritising effectively, building a robust business case, and tracking ROI.

What leading organisations are doing differently

The session highlighted a clear pattern:

They start with the problem, not the technology
They treat AI initiatives as business investments, not innovation experiments
They focus relentlessly on measurable outcomes and value tracking

Critically, they follow a repeatable journey:

Identify and prioritise use cases
Build a board-ready business case
Design and deploy solutions
Track impact and refine

Practical steps for tax leaders

Build a use case backlog - but prioritise ruthlessly

List potential opportunities across the tax lifecycle, then prioritise based on impact vs effort. Avoid spreading effort too thinly.

Treat AI like a board-level investment

Your business case should answer:

What value will this create?
How quickly will it deliver?
What risks does it reduce?

Design for adoption, not just deployment

Don’t stop at building solutions. Focus on:

User adoption
Change management
Integration into day-to-day workflows

Measure what matters

Track ROI beyond efficiency:

Risk reduction
Decision quality
Capacity released for higher-value work

Bottom line

AI success isn’t about experimentation at scale. It’s about focused execution that delivers real business outcomes.

Led by Stuart Tait, Tax Technology & Innovation Partner, KPMG in the UK, this breakout challenged the assumption that AI is always the answer and explored how tax leaders can select the right technology for the right problem.

One of the biggest risks in tax transformation today is not moving too slowly, it’s using the wrong tools for the job.

The “Architecture & Tooling” breakout challenged a common assumption: that AI is always the answer. Instead, it focused on helping tax leaders choose the right technology for each problem.

Key message

AI is powerful but it is not universal. The most effective tax functions are those that combine AI, analytics and traditional tools intelligently, based on the nature of the task.

What leading organisations are doing differently

Rather than defaulting to GenAI, they:

Decompose problems into component tasks
Assess data structure, complexity and risk
Select the most appropriate tool for each step

This results in hybrid solutions where:

GenAI handles unstructured content and narrative tasks
Analytics & ETL tools manage structured, repeatable processes
Specialist solutions deliver domain-specific accuracy

Practical steps for tax leaders

Start with the problem, not the tool

Break down workflows into stages:

Data extraction
Data preparation
Analysis
Output generation

Match tools to task type

Use AI for unstructured, interpretive work
Use rules/analytics for precision and repeatability

Build a simple decision framework

For every use case, ask:

·What data is involved?
·What level of accuracy is required?
·What governance is needed?

Bake in governance from the start

Technology decisions must include:

Auditability
Security
Risk management

Bottom line

The future isn’t AI-first. It’s solution-first using the right tool at the right stage of the process.

Led by Amar Thakrar, Partner, Tax Compliance & Transformation, KPMG in the UK, this breakout explored how tax teams need to evolve in an AI-enabled world, with greater emphasis on judgement, leadership and hybrid skills.

Technology is transforming tax, but the real differentiator is people.

The workforce breakout focused on how tax teams must evolve in an AI-enabled world, where automation handles execution and humans focus on judgement, oversight and influence.

Key message

AI doesn’t replace tax professionals, it reshapes their role. The future tax function is AI-augmented, not AI-replaced, with human capability becoming more valuable, not less.

What leading organisations are doing differently

They are actively redesigning their teams around:

Decision-making, not processing
Interpretation, not data gathering
Governance, not transaction handling

They are also investing in hybrid skills:

Tax expertise
Data literacy
Technology awareness
Change leadership
Stakeholder engagement
Effective communication

Practical steps for tax leaders

Redesign roles now, not later

Shift focus from:

Operations → oversight
Preparation → interpretation

Build hybrid capability

Upskill teams in:

Data fluency
AI basics
Commercial acumen

Lead from the front

Adoption starts at leadership level:

Use AI tools yourself
Set clear expectations
Normalise experimentation

Reframe the narrative

Be explicit:

AI supports people
Accountability remains human

Bottom line

The future tax function won’t be defined by its technology - but by the capability and mindset of its people.

Led by Tim Sarson, Partner, Global Transfer Pricing Services, KPMG in the UK and Angela Savin, Partner, KPMG Law, KPMG in the UK, this breakout examined how tax authorities are scaling AI and what organisations need to do to prepare for a more data-driven compliance and dispute environment.

Tax authorities are not standing still.

The disputes breakout brought a powerful reality check: while many organisations are still experimenting with AI, tax authorities are already scaling it in production, transforming how compliance and enforcement works.

Key message

The balance of power is shifting. AI is enabling authorities to operate with greater precision, scale and speed, raising expectations on data quality, transparency and defensibility.

What’s changing

Examples shared in the session showed:

AI-driven risk selection models improving audit precision
Automated processes increasing audit volume and efficiency
Advanced analytics identifying previously hidden patterns

This creates a new reality:

More targeted audits
Faster intervention
Less tolerance for error

What this means for tax leaders

The question is no longer: Are we compliant?
It is: Can we defend our position in a real-time, data-driven audit?

Practical steps for tax leaders

Strengthen data transparency and quality

Poor data will be exposed faster than ever.

Build audit-ready processes

Ensure:

Clear documentation
Explainable outputs
Traceable decision-making

Anticipate scrutiny, don’t react to it

Use analytics internally to:

Identify risks early
Simulate authority approaches

Embed defensibility into systems

Make governance part of the workflow, not an afterthought.

Bottom line

AI is transforming not just how tax is done but how it is challenged. Leaders must prepare for a world where authorities are faster, smarter and more data-driven than ever before.

Continue Exploring Make the Leap

The breakout sessions explored the practical realities of adopting AI and technology across the tax function from selecting the right tools and building AI capabilities, to preparing teams and responding to an increasingly data-driven compliance environment.

Continue your journey with our flagship articles, future-looking predictions and on-demand Summit content to discover what the future of tax could look like.