IBM and Microsoft Announce a New AI Agent Platform Designed for Industry-Specific Transformation

IBM  and Microsoft  announced Imagine Enterprise, an agentic platform designed to help enterprises build, run, and govern AI agents that help people execute industry-specific processes. IBM Consulting and Microsoft have combined their technologies and expertise with forward-deployed engineering support for qualifying engagements to help enterprises accelerate AI deployment.

Imagine Enterprise aims to help organizations—especialy-[n'[v;ly in regulated industries—combine human expertise with AI agents and connect them to unique enterprise data and daily processes. The platform is built to help organizations govern AI agents with controls, observability, and AI-compliance support designed to help secure industry-specific AI deployment.

IBM Consulting brings AI transformation expertise and a fleet of more than 6,000 AI agents and assets built on IBM Consulting Advantage, the company’s AI-powered delivery platform. Microsoft provides the AI, data, cloud, and security foundation that is designed to help the agents operate securely across the enterprise, while forward-deployed engineers from both companies can help customers move from experimentation to production.

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Instead of organizations having to start from scratch, replace the platforms they already depend on, or spend months assembling the pieces themselves, Imagine Enterprise is designed around three simple advantages:

• Instant Expertise: More than 6,000 AI agents and assets
  Starting with pre-built AI agents, assets, and deep industry expertise from day one. Organizations can begin with capabilities already built for their industry and adapt them to the unique needs of their business.

• Fits the Enterprise: A platform that adapts
  Imagine Enterprise is designed to connect with an organization’s existing data, processes, systems, and technology environment. Enterprises can start where they are, build on what they already have, and scale over time, with enterprise security, identity, AI governance, and control built into the experience.

• Intelligence Multiplier: Puts the knowledge of the business behind people and AI agents
  Imagine Enterprise brings IBM Consulting’s hands-on experience building and running more than 6,000 AI agents together with the Microsoft technologies to connect enterprise knowledge, data, and context across the organization. People and agents can operate with richer enterprise knowledge and context behind them, helping put what they already know to work across people and agents.

Supporting these advantages, Microsoft and GitHub technologies including Microsoft Foundry, GitHub Copilot, and Microsoft Copilot Studio help coordinate AI agents and enterprise systems, while Microsoft Fabric;l, Microsoft 365 infrastructure, Microsoft Entra, Microsoft Purview, Microsoft Defender, and Microsoft Azure provide the data, identity, AI governance, security, and cloud foundation. IBM Consulting Advantage’s Process Studio, Context Studio, and Advantage Core help organizations design, deploy, and govern tailored AI agents.

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From Emerging Technology to Business Opportunity
SEI, a leading global provider of financial technology, operations, and asset management services within the financial services industry, is looking to advance its enterprise transformation by exploring emerging and agentic technologies with IBM Consulting, with the support of Microsoft, and is leveraging other technologies from IBM Consulting and Microsoft to help improve how the company operates and enhance the experiences it delivers to employees and clients, supporting SEI’s commitment to sustainable growth.

“AI is evolving quickly, and our focus at SEI is on applying it with intention in ways that strengthen trust, enhance human decision-making, and create meaningful value across our business,” said Sneha Shah, Chief AI Strategist and Head of SEI Next. “Our work with IBM Consulting and Microsoft is helping us explore how emerging capabilities could support critical processes and be responsibly scaled over time, with the goal to create better experiences for our employees and clients. By combining emerging technology with SEI’s deep industry and operational expertise, we can move faster, scale more effectively, and create new opportunities for growth.”

“Clients are no longer looking for AI that simply helps people do the same work a little faster. They want to build an agentic business,” said Mohamad Ali, Senior Vice President and Head of IBM Consulting. “Microsoft and IBM are helping organizations bring human expertise and digital labor together in a way that can scale across the enterprise, to turn AI from a productivity aid into a real competitive advantage.”

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“Enterprise AI will be won by organizations that can turn their data, industry expertise, and AI into action,” said Rodrigo Kede Lima, President, Microsoft Frontier Company. “Together, Microsoft and IBM Consulting are bringing the best of our technology and expertise, to help customers move from AI ambition to business impact faster and with confidence.”

Imagine Enterprise’s industry-specific frameworks initially include financial services, insurance, and retail, and are designed to establish a repeatable blueprint for potential additional industries such as manufacturing, energy, public sector, mobility and more in the future.