- Surveyed executives report an eight-fold spike in AI-enabled workflows by 2025, with AI agents improving process efficiency, reducing costs and changing workflows.
- Respondents say 64% of their AI budgets are currently spent on core business functions.
- Over two-thirds (69%) of the executives surveyed said that “improving decision-making” is the biggest advantage of agent AI systems.
Armonk, New York, June 10, 2025 /prnewswire/ -New research by IBM (NYSE: IBM) Business Value Institute reveals that companies are expected to significantly expand their AI-enabled workflows.
AI conducted a profit survey of 2,900 executives around the world, revealing that respondents expect AI-enabled workflows to grow from 3% to 25% today by the end of 2025.
As the pace of digital conversion accelerates, businesses AI Agent As the next evolution of intelligent automation. 83% of respondents hope that AI agents will improve process efficiency and output by 2026, while 71% believe that agents will autonomously adapt to changing workflows.
“Increasing clients see agent AI as the key to moving past productivity gains and helping them actually gain business value from AI, especially when applied to core processes such as supply chains and HR.” Francesco BrennaVP & Senior Partners, AI Integration Services, IBM Consulting. “This isn't about connecting agents to existing processes and wanting the best. It means rebuilding the way processes run, redesigning the user experience, tuning agents end-to-end, and integrating the right data to provide context, memory and intelligence.”
According to the report, these are the top five benefits of agent AI systems that are driving adoption across the industry.
- Over two-thirds (69%) of the executives surveyed said that “improving decision-making” is the biggest advantage of agent AI systems.
- 67% of surveyed cited “cost reductions through automation” as profits.
- Almost half of the leaders surveyed (47%) show “competitive advantage” as the greatest benefit of an agent AI system.
- According to 44% of the executives surveyed, “employee experience” is cited as the best benefit.
- 42% of those surveyed show that “improving talent retention” is another major benefit for implementing agent AI systems.
While benefits were cited among survey participants, concerns about the adoption of agent AI still exist among leaders. What was surveyed indicates that concerns about data (49%), trust issues (46%) and skill shortages (42%) remain barriers to organizational recruitment.
Other important findings include:
- Surveyed executives show that AI investments increased to around 12% of IT in 2024. By 2026, participants expect this number to increase by more than two-thirds, accounting for 20% of IT spending.
- Respondents say that 64% of their AI budgets are currently spent on core business functions, highlighting the transition from the experimental stage of AI to a critical part of their business strategy.
- The proportion of surveyed organizations relying on an ad-hoc approach to AI has fallen from 19% reported last year to just 6% today, indicating an increase in trust and commitment to AI-driven transformation.
- One in four companies surveyed already uses the “AI-First” approach
- Among those suffering from the “AI-First” approach, respondents said they have improved operating margins (54%) to their previous 12 months of revenue growth (52%) and operating margin improvements (54%) initiatives.
Visit to see the complete study https://www.ibm.com/thought-leadership/institute-business-value/en-us/report/agentic-ai-profits.
Research Methodology:
In collaboration with Oxford Economics, the IBM Business Value Study Institute will draw insights from two 2025 surveys.: “AI in the core survey” (2,500 executives from 18 industries and 19 regions) and “Agent AI Pulse Survey” (15 roles, 11 industries, 400 C-Sweet executives from six countries). The survey questions examined the current role of AI in business operations, including its impact on revenue, profitability, productivity and resource efficiency. Further analysis was conducted to identify important relationships, trends, and associations within the dataset.
IBM's thought leadership think tank, IBM Institute for Business Value combines global research and performance data with the expertise of industry thinkers and leading scholars to provide insights that will make business leaders smarter. Visit us for more world-class thought leadership.www.ibm.com/ibv. To receive more insights, subscribe to our IdeaWatch newsletter.https://ibm.co/ibv-ideawatch.
About IBM
IBM is a leading global hybrid cloud and AI provider and consulting expertise. Help clients from over 175 countries leverage insights from data to streamline business processes, reduce costs and gain competitiveness in the industry. Thousands of government and business institutions in critical infrastructure areas such as financial services, telecommunications, and healthcare rely on IBM's hybrid cloud platform and Red Hat OpenShift to quickly, efficiently and safely impact digital transformations. IBM's groundbreaking innovations in AI, quantum computing, industry-specific cloud solutions and consulting provide clients with open and flexible options. All of this is supported by IBM's long-standing commitment to trust, transparency, responsibility, inclusivity and services. visitwww.ibm.comFor more information.
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IBM Consulting Communications
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Source IBM
