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Sammanfattning

The use of artificial intelligence by organizations has become an increasingly prominent element in organizations' external communication. At the same time, AI is associated with both strong opportunities and significant uncertainty, creating a strategic communication challenge for organizations seeking to present the technology as innovative, legitimate, and trustworthy. This study examines how AI-communicating service organizations construct AI in their external communication. Through a qualitative content analysis of official newsroom texts and press releases published by Klarna and Spotify, the study explores how opportunities and risks related to AI are framed, and how AI is constructed as a brand-strengthening and legitimacy-creating resource. The findings show that AI is not communicated as a neutral technology, but as a strategic communication object through which organizations shape meaning around both the technology and themselves. Both organizations primarily frame AI through opportunity-oriented narratives in which the technology is presented as transformative, valuable and future-oriented. However, they differ in their treatment of risk. Spotify communicates risks more explicitly, but consistently balances them with solutions, human control and responsibility. Klarna, on the contrary, largely downplays risks and presents AI as a primarily positive and self-evident part of the business. The study also shows that AI is communicated selectively and used in different ways to support legitimacy and corporate brand identity, for example Klarna primarily links AI to efficiency, customer value and social benefit, while Spotify more clearly emphasizes transparency, responsibility and human-centered control. Overall, the study contributes to a deeper understanding of AI as a central communication object in contemporary strategic communication.