Widest gap
Real Estate & Construction
65
Real Estate & Construction has the widest Change-Response Gap on the Index this month.
THE HYDER INDEX · AUGUST 2026
57
Narrow Gapdown 2 vs July
Industries are changing 1.3x faster than companies are responding.
Companies are keeping up with about 75% of the change around them.
The Hyder Index measures the Change-Response Gap: how fast industries are changing versus how fast companies are responding. 50 means they are even. Higher means the gap is wider. How we measure it →
Data window: July 1-31, 2026. Published August 4, 2026.
Updated the first Tuesday of every month. Next edition: November 3.
Biggest move
Media & Entertainment and Technology & AI
▼ 6
Each moved 6 points.
Keeping pace
2 industries
Financial Services & FinTech, Hospitality & Travel
What changed this month
The Hyder Index fell for the first time, from 59 to 57. Change did not slow down. Companies sped up. Response Scores rose in 14 of 15 industries. Netflix, the streaming service, said it used AI in about 300 titles. State Farm, the insurer, made daily AI use part of its agent contracts. Taco Bell, the fast-food chain, said its AI took orders at nearly 900 drive-thrus. The biggest US banks started building a shared digital-dollar system. One catch remains. Companies bought AI faster than they trained their people to use it.
Which industries are furthest behind?
Each industry gets a score from 0 to 100. 50 means companies are keeping pace with the change around them. Higher means change is winning.
0-50 Keeping Pace 51-59 Narrow Gap 60-69 Significant Gap 70-100 Critical Gap
Real Estate & Construction
65
Significant Gap
Real Estate & Construction rose 3 points to 65, the widest gap on the Index. Data center building and construction robotics funding pushed change up, while home builders answered a slow market with discounts. PulteGroup and NVR, two large home builders, did not mention AI on their earnings calls. The outside pressure is growing faster than the industry's response.
Change
54
Response
24
Keeping up
45%
Delta
+3
Legal & Professional Services
64
Significant Gap
Legal & Professional Services held at 64. Norm, a law firm where AI agents do the work and lawyers supervise, reached a $1.2 billion value in July. Cooley, a major law firm, launched Vanilla, a flat-fee service for funds work. Most firms still bill by the hour, so new rivals are moving faster than the big firms.
Change
58
Response
31
Keeping up
55%
Delta
0
HR & Future of Work
63
Significant Gap
HR & Future of Work eased to 63, and it was the only industry whose Response Score did not rise. Europe delayed its rules on AI in hiring, which took some pressure off employers. The Conference Board, a business research group, found only a third of workers got any recent AI training from their employer. Workers are using AI faster than companies are teaching it.
Change
64
Response
38
Keeping up
60%
Delta
-1
Healthcare & MedTech
63
Significant Gap
Healthcare & MedTech improved for the second month in a row, to 63. England's National Health Service followed last month's staff rollout with a £10 billion AI program, including an AI triage tool in its patient app. Tempus AI, a health data company, agreed to buy the cancer-genomics firm Personalis in the biggest health tech deal of the summer. Once a health system decides to act, this industry shows the gap can close.
Change
67
Response
41
Keeping up
60%
Delta
-1
Education & EdTech
62
Significant Gap
Education & EdTech fell 2 points to 62 as its Response Score moved up from the lowest on the Index. The University of Maine System gave ChatGPT Edu, OpenAI's campus version of ChatGPT, to every student and employee. Cal State, the public university system, renewed its OpenAI contract. Most students still have never been taught how to use AI well.
Change
51
Response
27
Keeping up
55%
Delta
-2
Media & Entertainment
62
Significant Gap
Media & Entertainment's gap got smaller for the first time, falling 6 points to 62. Netflix, the streaming service, said it used generative AI across hundreds of titles, and Warner Bros. Discovery, owner of HBO Max, added AI search to the app. Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery have a signed merger agreement but agreed not to close before a state antitrust trial set for March 2027. The leaders are now reporting AI results instead of plans.
Change
66
Response
42
Keeping up
65%
Delta
-6
Technology & AI
59
Narrow Gap
Technology & AI fell 6 points to 59, moving from the Significant Gap into the Narrow Gap. Microsoft and Amazon, the two tech giants that sell cloud computing, reported fast cloud growth tied to AI, and several major AI models launched in July. Investors rewarded the companies that showed AI revenue and punished those that showed mostly cost.
Change
78
Response
60
Keeping up
75%
Delta
-6
Energy & Utilities
58
Narrow Gap
Energy & Utilities fell 3 points to 58, moving into the Narrow Gap. NextEra, a large power company, reported a record project backlog, and Dominion, another large utility, has a large amount of data-center demand in contract talks. Pressure kept rising too, as data centers pushed up the cost of the biggest US power auction. Both sides are moving fast, and change is still ahead.
Change
68
Response
52
Keeping up
75%
Delta
-3
Direct Sales & Franchising
57
Narrow Gap
Direct Sales & Franchising improved to 57. Taco Bell, the fast-food chain, said its AI assistant now takes orders at nearly 900 drive-thrus. Its parent company, Yum, is rolling one technology platform, Byte, across all its brands. The customer is the harder problem, as Domino's and McDonald's, two large pizza and burger chains, reported softer demand.
Change
49
Response
36
Keeping up
75%
Delta
-2
Manufacturing & Industrial
55
Narrow Gap
Manufacturing & Industrial edged down to 55. Factories added workers for the first time in almost three years, and Toyota, Bosch, and Hitachi, three large manufacturers, committed billions to new US plants. Humanoid robots moved from demos into real orders. Change and response rose together, so the gap barely moved.
Change
57
Response
46
Keeping up
80%
Delta
-1
Insurance
55
Narrow Gap
Insurance fell 3 points to 55. Travelers, a large insurer, told investors it is handling some claims from start to finish without a person. State Farm, another large insurer, will require all of its agents to use AI every day under new contracts. The systems behind the scenes are going in faster than the AI products customers can see.
Change
57
Response
47
Keeping up
85%
Delta
-3
Transportation & Logistics
55
Narrow Gap
Transportation & Logistics widened slightly to 55. Waymo, the driverless ride service, announced its largest single-day expansion, and Atlas Energy, an oilfield company, committed to running 100 driverless trucks by mid-2027. UPS, the delivery company, finished its network overhaul and raised its outlook. When customers start buying self-driving fleets, the technology has left the test phase.
Change
52
Response
42
Keeping up
80%
Delta
+1
Retail & CPG
54
Narrow Gap
Retail & CPG rose 2 points to 54 as AI shopping moved faster than most retailers. During Prime Day, shoppers who arrived from AI tools bought at a higher rate than other visitors, according to Adobe, the software company. Amazon, the online retailer, said hundreds of millions of customers used its AI shopping assistant in the past year. Product makers like P&G, the consumer goods company, barely mentioned AI shopping on their earnings calls.
Change
58
Response
51
Keeping up
85%
Delta
+2
Financial Services & FinTech
48
Keeping Pace
Financial Services & FinTech rose to 48, still in Keeping Pace. At JPMorgan, the bank's CEO Jamie Dimon said AI has already cut 30 to 40% of jobs in some units. The biggest US banks are building a shared digital-dollar system, while card networks and payment companies launched a rival stablecoin in July. Banks are moving faster than most industries, but their newest rivals ship in months.
Change
56
Response
60
Keeping up
100%
Delta
+2
Hospitality & Travel
43
Keeping Pace
Hospitality & Travel improved to 43, the smallest gap on the Index. The World Cup raised room prices more than it filled rooms, and host-city prices are now coming back down. Marriott and IHG, two of the largest hotel companies, launched AI booking tools in the same week. Response is still running ahead of change in this industry.
Change
38
Response
52
Keeping up
100%
Delta
-1
August in two stories
Technology & AI moves into the Narrow Gap
59Narrow Gap
Technology & AI fell 6 points to 59 this month. That moved it out of the Significant Gap and into the Narrow Gap. Its Change Score held at 78, so the pressure did not ease. Its Response Score rose from 47 to 60, the biggest response gain on the Index.
Earnings calls in late July put numbers behind the talk. Microsoft, the software and cloud company, said its Azure cloud business grew 43%. Azure also passed $100 billion a year in sales, Microsoft said. Amazon, the online retailer and cloud provider, said its AWS cloud unit grew 37%. The four biggest tech companies plan to spend about $600 billion this year on AI data centers and chips. Four major AI models launched in July. Apple, the iPhone maker, moved its new Siri to Google's Gemini model instead of waiting on its own. Investors are now grading AI spending against AI results.
Real Estate & Construction now has the widest gap
65Significant Gap
Real Estate & Construction rose 3 points to 65. That is now the widest gap on the Index, and the first time this industry has held the top spot. Its Change Score jumped from 46 to 54. Its Response Score rose only from 22 to 24.
AI is now driving the construction market itself. Data center construction starts reached $81.5 billion in the first half of 2026. That is already more than all of 2025. Construction robotics companies raised over $100 million in July. Home builders answered a slow market with discounts. PulteGroup, a large home builder, reported orders up 6% on heavy discounts and incentives. Its earnings call did not mention AI. NVR, another large builder, cut prices about 5% to grow orders. The pressure on this industry is coming from outside, and most of the response is still price cuts.
What moved the numbers this month
Six observable signals of change from the July data window, one per signal, across the economy.
AI shopping went mainstream this summer. In a CI&T survey, 74% of consumers said they have used an AI agent while shopping. In the same survey, 55% said AI makes them shop more. During Prime Day, shoppers who arrived at retail sites from AI tools bought at a 40% higher rate than everyone else, according to Adobe, the software company. A year ago, those shoppers bought at a 23% lower rate. AI went from a place people browse to a place people decide.
Job cut announcements slowed, with June cuts down 53% from May. The bigger number came from a bank. JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon said AI has already reduced staff by 30 to 40% in some of the bank's units. AI was the top stated reason for US job cuts for the fifth month in a row. US employers announced 33,429 job cuts in July, according to Challenger, Gray & Christmas, the outplacement firm. AI was cited in 10,970 of them. That brings AI-cited cuts to 112,713 so far this year. The cuts are moving out of press releases and into everyday budgets.
The four biggest tech companies said they will spend roughly $600 billion this year on AI data centers and chips. This time, the market graded them differently. Microsoft and Amazon, the two largest cloud sellers among them, rose 8 to 9% because their AI is producing revenue. Meta, the Facebook owner, fell about 10%. Alphabet, Google's parent company, spent more cash than it took in for the first time since its 2004 IPO. Investors stopped rewarding big plans. They now pay for results.
Europe's AI rules took effect on August 2. Companies can now be fined up to 15 million euros, or 3% of worldwide revenue, for breaking them. Chatbots must say they are AI, and AI-made content must be labeled. At the same time, Europe delayed its harder rules on AI in hiring and lending until December 2027. The rules covering AI that customers can see arrived first.
High school students from all 50 states met in Boston and passed their own model AI law, the Students First Act. The vote was 82 to 16. Their rules: teach AI skills from the first school device, no AI on graded tests, and no AI-written assignments. One student said, 'We missed the mark with social media and phones.' The school superintendents' association is sending the plan to 10,000 school leaders. The generation using AI the most is the one asking for rules.
The power grid sent the AI boom its first big bill. PJM, the largest US grid operator, hit the price ceiling in its yearly power auction for the third time in a row. The auction cost $16.4 billion. Data centers caused $6.3 billion of that cost. The auction also came up 6,831 megawatts short of its reliability target. Last month, rising power demand was a forecast. This month it was an invoice.
The Read
The Hyder Index fell for the first time, from 59 to 57. Change did not slow down. The average Change Score rose from 55.7 to 58.2. What moved was the response. Response Scores rose in 14 of 15 industries. The average Response Score climbed from 38.2 to 43.3. The Gap Ratio tightened from 1.5x to 1.3x.
And this was real deployment. England's National Health Service turned one decision into a £10 billion AI program. Netflix, the streaming service, said it used AI in about 300 titles. State Farm, the insurer, put daily AI use into its agent contracts. Taco Bell, the fast-food chain, said its AI now takes orders at nearly 900 drive-thrus. Marriott and IHG, two large hotel companies, launched AI booking tools in the same week. In July, one decision in England's health system moved one industry. This month, moves like that showed up across the board.
The stock market noticed too. In one week of earnings reports, Microsoft and Amazon, the two cloud giants, rose 8 to 9%. Their AI spending is producing revenue. Meta, the Facebook owner, fell about 10%. Alphabet, Google's parent company, spent more cash than it took in for the first time since its 2004 IPO. Investors are now paying for results. Response is something the market prices.
The misread of the month
The easy read is that the gap is closing because companies bought AI. Most of the new response was money and tools. Training lagged behind. The Conference Board, a business research group, found that 55% of workers use AI every day or every week. Only a third have had any employer AI training in the past six months. In schools, 92% of students have used AI, according to a Microsoft report. Yet 77% have never been taught how. HR was the one industry whose Response Score did not move. The tools are in. The training is not.
The window
A two-point drop is small, and September will show whether this was a turn or a pause. The training gap is still wide open. Most of the training workers did get covered only basic prompting, the Conference Board found. That part of the response has barely started, so there is still room to lead.
What to do with this
If your company shipped AI tools this summer, many others did too. The next advantage goes to the companies that teach their people to use what they just bought. Start with the workers already using AI on their own, and train them past the basics.
Per the Hyder Index, the August 2026 reading is 57, and industries are changing 1.3x faster than companies are responding.
The two independent reviewers' ratings differed by 0.15 points on average on the 0 to 5 scale.
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