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The Death of the "Application" & The Rise of the Agentic Workforce

Future of Enterprise Software (CRM & Beyond) 

CRM Playaz "What is CRM in 2026?" Executive Roundtable


The era of "logging in" is ending. In a definitive industry forecast featuring the "Big Six" platform leaders (Salesforce, Microsoft, Oracle, SAP, Adobe, ServiceNow) and top VCs, the consensus for 2026 is absolute: CRM is no longer a destination; it is an invisible orchestration layer. We are shifting from "Chatbot" novelties to Agentic AI—digital workers that don't just summarize meetings but execute complex workflows across Finance, Supply Chain, and CX without human intervention. The "per-seat" SaaS business model is facing an existential crisis.

This was a collective industry obituary for the traditional "user interface." The leaders of the world's largest platforms confirmed that by 2026, the "Application" will dissolve into "Invisible UI" (email, Slack, Teams, background processes). The focus has shifted entirely to Agentic Orchestration—managing fleets of autonomous agents that interact not just with humans, but with each other to resolve issues, close books, and manage supply chains.




We are entering a "Golden Age of Margin Expansion."

Why should tech leaders pay attention? The Governance Gap is your new Technical Debt. Deploying "probabilistic" LLMs into "deterministic" enterprise workflows (e.g., insurance claims, regulatory reporting) is a minefield. The "Big Six" are scrambling to build "Governance by Design"—embedding policy, toxicity checks, and audit trails directly into the platform layer. If you deploy agents without a "Customer Memory System" (a persistent, unified context layer), you are automating negligence.

It is no longer just "Salesforce vs. Microsoft." The battle line is The Platform vs. The Shadow.

  • The Platform: The Big Six fighting to be the "Ring Leader" or "Orchestration Layer" that governs all agents.

  • The Shadow: A swarm of nimble, "AI-native" startups offering specialized agents for $200/month that bypass IT procurement. Employees are already using these.

What is the real differentiation? Marketing: "We have the best Agents." Reality: Agents are becoming commodities. The only defensible moat is Context and Control.

  • Microsoft: Betting on owning the "surface" (Teams/Outlook) where work happens.

  • Oracle: Betting on the infrastructure/security layer.

  • Salesforce/ServiceNow: Betting on the "Workflow" and "Data Gravity" (Customer Memory).

  • The Truth: Most "GenAI" features today are lazy. They give generic answers. The differentiation lies in a platform's ability to force specificity and determinism out of probabilistic models.

Advice for leaders: 30–90 Day Plan

  • 30 Days (Audit): Identify "Shadow AI." Which consumer-grade agents (ChatGPT, Claude, etc.) are your employees already using to do their jobs? Don't ban them; study the use cases.

  • 60 Days (Re-evaluate): Stop issuing RFPs for "Chatbots." Demand "Agentic Roadmaps" from your vendors. Ask: "Show me an agent that executes a 5-step workflow across three different systems without a human loop."

  • 90 Days (Pricing Strategy): Start the conversation about Outcome-Based Pricing. If a vendor wants to charge you per-seat while selling you technology designed to reduce seats, their business model is broken. Don't pay for the disruption twice.

Analyst Take

We are in 1995 again—the infrastructure build-out phase of a new era. The "Chatbot" hype of 2023-2024 was a false dawn; Agentic AI is the real revolution. However, expect a "Trough of Disillusionment" in 2026 as enterprises realize that "General Purpose Agents" are dangerous and lazy in complex business environments.

The Winners will not be the companies with the smartest models, but those with the strictest Governance and the deepest Data Context. The "Application" is dead. Long live the Workflow.

Participants

Hosts:

  • Paul Greenberg & Brent Leary, CRM Playaz

The "Big Six" Enterprise Panel:

  • John Taschek, SVP of Strategy, Salesforce

  • Marco Casalaina, VP of Products, Microsoft

  • Brett Weigl, SVP of Product Management, Oracle

  • Anthony Leaper, GVP, SAP

  • Terence Chester, VP of Product Impact, ServiceNow

  • Adam Justice, Director of Product Management, Adobe

The Investor Panel:

  • Scott Beechuk, Partner, Norwest Venture Partners

  • Larry Augustin, Managing Director, Augustin Ventures (former CEO, SugarCRM)

  • Keith Teare, CEO, SignalRank

  • Anand Thaker, Strategic Advisor (PE/VC)

The Analyst Panel:

  • Michael Fauscette, Founder, Arion Research

  • Rebecca Wettemann, CEO, Valoir

  • Shashi Bellamkonda, Principal Research Director, Info-Tech Research Group

Sources

Tune in tomorrow



Shashi Bellamkonda
About the Author
Shashi Bellamkonda

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Disclaimer: This blog post reflects my personal views only. AI tools may have been used for brevity, structure, or research support. Please independently verify any information before relying on it. This content does not represent the views of my employer, Infotech.com.

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