Talking AI: the AI agent — of thousands of “agentic” vendors, only about 130 truly are

An AI agent does more than answer a question: it chains actions toward a goal, with a level of autonomy you set. The market is crowded with confusion. Gartner estimates that, of the thousands of vendors calling themselves “agentic,” only about 130 truly are, and predicts that more than 40% of agentic AI projects will be canceled by the end of 2027 for lack of clear value or adequate guardrails. The right question to a vendor is not “what can your agent do?” but “what does it do without human approval, and where does it stop?”

Before committing a budget, insist on a demonstration on your own use cases and get it in writing which actions the agent performs on its own and the threshold above which a human decides.

Source: Gartner, “Gartner Predicts Over 40% of Agentic AI Projects Will Be Canceled by End of 2027,” June 25, 2025.