This is an excerpt from DIGITAL IMPACT: The Human-Element of AI-Driven Transformation, by Steve Lucas, Chairman and CEO of Boomi.
We’re experiencing a remarkable digital era shift that will impact every aspect of human existence and radically transform business – and sooner than we think.
If you’re waiting for the AI economy to arrive, you missed the launch. It’s already here. There’s a reason why the world’s most valuable technology companies are heavily involved with AI.
In 2024 alone, Microsoft, Google, and Meta all confirmed they would spend billions on new data centers for AI. In the larger business community, Goldman Sachs estimated $200 billion globally would be invested in AI by 2025 as projects go from pilots to scale. One investment that blows my mind is how Microsoft and OpenAI are planning to spend as much as $100 billion over five years on a data center project that includes an AI supercomputer. Analysts estimate $1 trillion could be spent on data centers and energy expenses in the AI boom.
The magnitude of investment is beyond crazy and will reverberate throughout our businesses. It will bring vast disruption and fuel positive transformation at unprecedented speed and scale.
Every company, big or small, regardless of industry, is under enormous pressure to implement AI models to improve customer support, supply chain management, software development, predictive analytics, risk management, fraud detection, human resources, and so much more. The impact will reach every aspect of our business operations.
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A McKinsey & Company study determined that the number one initiative for CEOs in 2024 was finding how to make AI use cases a reality. The consulting firm wrote: “But while innovators dominate headlines, it’s scalers that dominate markets. CEOs need to figure out three things, posthaste: which parts of the business can benefit, how to scale from one application to many, and how the new tools will reshape their industry.”
A 2024 PwC survey of more than 4,700 CEOs put that idea in more stark terms. It found that 45% were not confident that their businesses would survive more than a decade on their current path if they didn’t adjust to fast-moving changes that include AI. Leaders know a tsunami is approaching and will leave their companies underwater if they don’t figure out how to deploy this business-altering technology.
That’s why I believe that if 2024 was the year of AI adoption, then 2025 is the year of AI explosion.
Hello, AI Big Bang!
The cosmic Big Bang created galaxies, stars, planets, and everything we observe in the universe today. Something similar is happening with AI – creating something new and wonderful. It’s like nothing I’ve ever seen in my nearly 30-year career in business, and it’s truly transformative. The universe of business opportunities is expanding exponentially. Right now, “AI” means different things to different people – everything from ChatGPT to fears of Skynet taking over. Sometimes, I get asked to speak to C-level peers about AI developments. At one session with about 200 top leaders, I explained they all needed to get their arms around one game-changing reality: AI agents. These are pieces of software that can mimic human activity. AI agents are programmed to act independently (without direct human intervention) to execute actions, accomplish routine tasks, and automate basic business decision-making.
Think about your typical day. Many of the emails you receive are likely AI-generated. If you scroll through TikTok or Instagram, you’ll see AI’s influence in the choice of videos suggested to you. Any news you might want to read, food you might want to eat, and things you want to purchase? AI’s digital fingerprints are there. And don’t get me started on the ads you see on every website, many of which seem to be following you around the Internet. Even when you’re relaxing and want to binge-watch a show on Netflix, AI is there, serving up recommendations based on your viewing habits.
AI already influences your life to varying degrees hundreds of times each day. But get ready for something even more significant: the agents are coming.
Common AI models, such as the various iterations of ChatGPT, perform functions when a human triggers them. You ask, and they respond. (“Write me a Yoda-style Shakespearean sonnet.”) But autonomous and semi-autonomous agents are next-level AI because they’re not mere chatterboxes. They can use software apps and tools, schedule meetings, send emails, analyze data, and more.
We’ve been ceding ground to forms of AI for at least a decade. But soon, these agents will embed AI even more deeply in our lives. The first generation of agents is impacting customer success, finance, HR, and more as they help humans work more efficiently. This is just the start. Two years from now, agents will be ubiquitous in our businesses. We’ll have agents for everything. Think of them as friendly, valuable minions. I envision organizations deploying small armies of these agents. It will reach the scale where agents will have their own agents to help them accomplish tasks.
The simplest example I can think of is the expense report. Today, managers must approve expenses because we require a human in the loop to interpret and apply company policies. However, within the next 24 months, human approval of expense reports will be a thing of the past. Agents will do it instead.
This is how agents will reinvent how we live and work. We’re at the dawn of “The Agent Economy” in the same way the iPhone led to “The App Economy.” This is our brave new world, where we’ll watch the gap between AI potential and AI value quickly disappear. Right now, it might still be the stuff of science fiction, but soon, we’ll have access to a personal AI agent that knows us and helps with daily, mundane tasks – both in and out of work.
A digital era shift is happening. We’re witnessing a democratization of hyper-advanced technology, and innovation is happening at an unprecedented scale. The speed of AI advances makes weeks feel like an eternity. It’s hard not to think we only know a fraction of what we need to make sense of AI. But we understand that the consequences are severe if we don’t adapt.
Excerpted with permission from the publisher, Wiley, from DIGITAL IMPACT: The Human-Element of AI-Driven Transformation by Steve Lucas. Copyright © 2025 by Boomi, LP. All rights reserved.
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