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Dreamforce 2026: The Agentic Enterprise Comes to Life

Mickey North Rizza — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Salesforce held its annual Dreamforce conference in San Francisco, CA on September 14-17^th, 2026. The event was well attended with at least 43,000 on site and thousands online for the key notes.

Hospitality's Infrastructure Imperative: Powering AI-Ready Hotels and Restaurants — Key Insights from the IDC Retail Technologies and Business Processes Trends Survey, 2026

Dorothy Creamer — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC presentation presents the results from IDC's 2026 Retail Technologies and Business Process Trends Survey, focusing on hotel/accommodation and restaurant respondents. Drawing on 126 hospitality operators, the study's coverage spans technology investment, customer experience, and security priorities. The findings indicate that agentic AI has moved from pilot to mainstream in hotels and restaurants, with half already invested, even as data modernization gaps threaten to undercut the payoff.

"AI is only as strong as the data foundation beneath it," says Dorothy Creamer, senior research manager, Hospitality and Travel Digital Strategies, IDC. "Operators who modernize their data infrastructure first will be the ones who actually capture AI's returns."

IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Telco Network Operations Managed Services 2026 Vendor Assessment

Bruno Teyton, Chris Barnard — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC study highlights a shift from cost-driven outsourcing to strategic partnerships, as communication SPs (CSPs) increasingly rely on managed SPs for operational transformation, automation, and AI integration. Vendors are evaluated on their ability to deliver autonomous, secure, and multi-domain network operations, with leaders distinguished by advanced AI capabilities, modular platforms, and strong co-innovation strategies. The managed services model is central to CSPs' pursuit of operational excellence and differentiated customer experience.

"The network operations managed services market for CSPs enters a new phase with growing technology complexity and CSP business transformation," says Bruno Teyton, associate vice president for IDC's network infrastructure and services group. "MSPs in this space need to help CSPs navigate this transformation, automate network operations, and deliver tangible outcomes with a partnering and co-innovation mindset."

IDC PeerScape: Practices for AI Workload Placement

Stanley B. Gibson — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC PeerScape features interviews with IT leaders from Northern Trust, the U.S. Air Force, and a major financial services organization headquartered in the United States, examining the practices they have employed to optimize AI workload placement. These practices include focusing on appropriate, AI-ready workloads; weighing trade-offs and making judgment calls; hiring or training staff with the right skills; acquiring the tools necessary to manage workload placement; evaluating the methods in use; and adjusting based on performance.

“For IT leaders, the AI era is the top priority. Success requires matching AI workloads with the optimal platforms, whether on premises, in the cloud, or in colocation facilities. Doing so requires perceptive analysis, ongoing diligence, and awareness of the directions in which platforms are evolving. AI workloads will only tend to increase over time, and what works tomorrow might be different from what works today,” says Stanley B. Gibson, adjunct research advisor for IDC’s Executive Programs (IEP).

IDC Survey: IDC Worldwide Supply Chain Survey: Manufacturing

Simon Ellis — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Survey provides insight into the supply chain challenges and opportunities manufacturing companies are facing, their current priorities, the drivers of change in the strategic focus of their supply chains, the impact of ongoing disruptions (protectionism/tariffs, economic uncertainty), and the use of modern digital technologies, particularly AI. The data for this presentation comes from the IDC's 2026 Supply Chain Survey and reflects the manufacturing respondent base across all regions polled. The sample size for this survey was 1,374, fielded in June 2026, with 792 specific to manufacturing.

Salesforce Unveils AIforce and an Enterprise AI Harness, Extending the Agentic Platform to Developers and Third-Party AI Surfaces

Adam Reeves — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Ahead of and during Dreamforce 2026, Salesforce introduced a trusted enterprise AI harness with a new AI control plane, then introduced AIforce, a headless interface powered by Headless Toolkit that carries Salesforce data and logic into Claude, Slack, and Lightning (with more to come), alongside a refreshed developer toolchain built around autonomous coding agents. Together, the announcements consolidate several previously separate initiatives into a single governance-and-delivery narrative, signaling that Salesforce is betting on governed context and developer tooling rather than model selection as its lasting differentiator.

The Autonomous IT Operations Imperative: How Agentic AI Is Reshaping AIOps

Deepika Giri, Daeil Chun — Mon, 28 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Perspective analyzes the imperative for autonomous IT operations powered by agentic AI, focusing on Asia/Pacific enterprise adoption, operational readiness, and the critical role of unified observability. Drawing on IDC survey data, the document highlights how agentic AIOps is enabling organizations to scale production AI, overcome operational bottlenecks, and meet emerging sovereignty requirements. The document also provides actionable guidance for IT leaders to sequence investments, assess vendor claims, and build the foundation for resilient, policy-compliant AI operations.

“Agentic AIOps marks a fundamental inflection point, not merely advancing IT automation but establishing the essential architecture for enterprise-scale AI. Enterprises that converge observability, operationalize reasoning-driven agents, and architect sovereignty from inception are not just optimizing — they are redefining operational leverage and systemic resilience beyond the reach of legacy paradigms. The gulf between innovators and followers is accelerating; the strategic groundwork laid today will irrevocably shape tomorrow’s competitive landscape,” says Deepika Giri, VP, Asia/Pacific Artificial Intelligence Platforms and Advisory, IDC.

IDC MarketScape: Worldwide AI-Enabled IT Service Management Software 2026 Vendor Assessment

Snow Tempest — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC study presents a vendor assessment of the worldwide IT service management software market through the IDC MarketScape model.

"The IT service management software market continues to evolve, often facilitated by automation and AI, which leads to needs for accurate organizational and technical context," said Snow Tempest, research manager, IT Service Management at IDC.

IDC MarketScape: Worldwide AI-Enabled Operational ERP 2026 Vendor Assessment

Mickey North Rizza, Sarah Lee, Bo Lykkegaard — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC study provides a thorough assessment of the worldwide AI-enabled operational ERP applications market and discusses the most important criteria for companies to consider when selecting a solution.

"AI-enabled operational ERP systems are a hot topic, with strong investments in 2026. Organizations are desperately working to improve the integration of financials in operations, and AI-enabled operational ERP technology does just that," said Mickey North Rizza, Group VP, Enterprise Software at IDC. "Vendors are working at all levels across industries, functions, and workflows, as well as with their ecosystem partners, to create an AI-enabled experience for end users. It comes down to selecting the vendors that meet the organization at its level of comfort and readiness and align with its road map, so that they can move together into the AI world."

IDC MarketScape: Worldwide Agentic Marketing for Midmarket Organizations 2026 Vendor Assessment

Roger Beharry Lall — Fri, 25 Sep 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC MarketScape evaluates agentic marketing platforms available to midsize organizations and provides essential guidance for technology leaders in this segment. Midsize marketing teams typically run several tools across content, campaigns, and channels acquired at different times for different reasons and are looking for platforms that can coordinate that sprawl rather than add to it. This study defines the market, evaluates vendors serving midsize buyers and assesses how well current platforms handle multi-agent coordination and independent learning across channels, which are the capabilities that most affect a growing marketing team's ability to scale without adding headcount. IDC finds meaningful progress on integration and orchestration since the 2025 assessment of this segment, alongside a persistent gap in agents that improve their own performance over time without manual retraining. Midsize buyers should weigh both dimensions carefully when selecting a platform built to grow with them.

"Midsize buyers want a platform priced for their budget, built for how a midsized team actually works, and simple enough that value shows up in the first quarter instead of the fifth," says Roger Beharry Lall, research director on advertising technologies and SMB marketing applications, IDC.