AI Agent Deployments Surge as Enterprises Ramp Up Automation

Enterprise artificial intelligence (AI) agent deployments have more than doubled in a year, according to Salesforce's second Agentic Enterprise Index. The average business now runs 13 agents, up from five in February 2025, with deployment timelines compressing by 53%.

Joe Inzerillo, President of Enterprise AI and Technology at Salesforce, noted that these agents are producing measurable commercial returns across retail and services. Deployment time fell from four days to 1.9 days between February 2025 and April 2026, with agents now averaging six skills each, up from two.

The Agentic Enterprise Index found that actions executed per account grew at a 31% compound monthly rate. Service industries relying on business process outsourcing (BPO) for back-office operations are among the earliest enterprise movers in agentic AI, drawn by cost and deployment cycle compression.