At IBM’s annual THINK event, the company revealed groundbreaking hybrid technologies that will help businesses break down barriers to scaling enterprise AI. These new solutions enable organizations to build and deploy AI agents using their own enterprise data, setting the stage for faster and more effective AI integration across diverse environments.
Meeting the Demands of the AI Explosion
IBM estimates that by 2028, over one billion apps will emerge, creating pressure for businesses to scale across increasingly fragmented environments. This requires seamless integration, orchestration, and data readiness. An IBM CEO study also reveals that business leaders expect the growth rate of AI investments to double in the next two years, yet only 25% of AI initiatives have achieved the ROI they anticipated.
To address these challenges, IBM is combining its hybrid technologies, agent capabilities, and deep industry expertise from IBM Consulting to help businesses operationalize AI more effectively.
IBM’s Vision for the Future of AI Agents
Arvind Krishna, Chairman and CEO of IBM, stated, “The era of AI experimentation is over. Today’s competitive advantage comes from purpose-built AI integration that drives measurable business outcomes.”
IBM is equipping enterprises with hybrid technologies that simplify complexity and accelerate production-ready AI implementations. The new watsonx Orchestrate suite empowers businesses to build AI agents that integrate seamlessly with over 80 leading business applications, helping organizations deploy agents that work across a variety of apps, data systems, and cloud environments.
Features of watsonx Orchestrate
- Build-your-own-agent in under five minutes, with a suite of tools that make it easier to integrate, customize, and deploy agents built on any framework.
- Pre-built domain agents specialized in areas such as HR, sales, and procurement, along with utility agents for simpler tasks like web research and calculations.
- Integration with 80+ leading applications from providers like Adobe, AWS, Microsoft, Oracle, Salesforce, SAP, and Workday.
- Agent orchestration to manage multi-agent, multi-tool coordination for complex projects like workflow planning and task routing.
- Agent observability for performance monitoring, guardrails, model optimization, and governance across the entire agent lifecycle.
The new Agent Catalog will provide simplified access to 150+ agents and pre-built tools from IBM and its extensive ecosystem of partners, including companies like Box, MasterCard, Oracle, Salesforce, and ServiceNow.
WebMethods Hybrid Integration for Seamless Connectivity
As AI adoption grows, integration remains a significant challenge. Most enterprises still rely on a patchwork of APIs, apps, and systems spread across on-prem and multi-cloud environments, which were not built to work together. IBM introduces webMethods Hybrid Integration, a solution that moves beyond rigid workflows and enables intelligent, agent-driven automation across hybrid cloud environments.
An independent Forrester TEI study found that organizations adopting IBM’s webMethods integration capabilities realized significant ROI over three years, including a 40% reduction in downtime, 33% time savings on complex projects, and 67% savings on simple projects.
Unlocking Unstructured Data with watsonx.data
Unstructured data – often trapped in contracts, spreadsheets, and presentations – holds immense untapped potential. IBM is evolving watsonx.data to help organizations activate this valuable resource, driving more accurate and effective AI applications.
The new watsonx.data integrates an open data lakehouse with data fabric capabilities, enabling businesses to unify, govern, and activate data across clouds and formats. IBM’s data intelligence tools can extract deep insights from unstructured data, enabling AI systems to deliver more accurate predictions.
Additionally, IBM’s upcoming acquisition of DataStax will enhance its ability to harness unstructured data for generative AI, improving vector search capabilities and expanding integration with Meta’s Llama Stack.
Infrastructure for Scaling AI
IBM is launching IBM LinuxONE 5, the company’s most secure and performant Linux platform for data and applications. This platform is designed to handle up to 450 billion AI inference operations per day and includes new AI accelerators, such as the IBM Telum II on-chip AI processor and the IBM Spyre Accelerator (available Q4 2025).
IBM LinuxONE 5 offers advanced security features, including quantum-safe encryption and confidential containers to protect data. IBM also boasts a 40% reduction in total cost of ownership over five years when moving workloads to LinuxONE.
IBM’s new hybrid technologies are set to revolutionize the scalability of enterprise AI, allowing businesses to integrate, deploy, and scale AI agents seamlessly. By combining watsonx Orchestrate, webMethods integration, and advanced AI infrastructure like IBM LinuxONE 5, IBM is positioning itself as the leader in AI-driven business transformation. As AI adoption accelerates, IBM’s solutions will help enterprises manage complexity, unlock unstructured data, and accelerate AI deployment across hybrid environments.
