Investec Whitepaper

Foreword

At Investec Software, we have worked with a lot of clients that shaped Enterprise Software. With decades of transaction experience across Business Process Management, Automation, Workflow and adjacent fields, one of our core focuses lies in the layer of the Enterprise Software stack that will be most transformed by autonomy -where orchestration, intelligence, and value creation converge.

Long before agentic AI became a headline term, we saw its foundations being laid by the companies we advised, and it is now that the industry reaches a pivotal moment. This gives us a unique perspective on the future of Enterprise Software, and we are aspiring to leverage this position to support the next generation of software leaders.

Executive Summary

Enterprise Software is on the cusp of its most profound transformation since the shift to the cloud. The next, already strongly emerging wave is agentic AI: systems that reason, plan, and act autonomously. The Autonomous Enterprise is no longer science fiction—it is fast becoming an achievable horizon.

This view is echoed by leading research desks: Goldman Sachs sees agentic AI expanding the software market by over 10%, Morgan Stanley calls it a new value layer redefining SaaS efficiency, and Citi Research envisions an enterprise powered by autonomous agents within CRM, ERP, and BI.

Together, this early but growing body of research reinforces a single conclusion: the next structural evolution in enterprise software will be built around autonomous systems that not only assist humans but execute, learn, and govern within defined business objectives. We take this a step further, identifying that agentic AI requires not a bolt-on integration but a fundamental re-architecture of the enterprise software stack—and we provide evidence that this transformation is already underway.

This is further evidenced by investors already pricing in the disruptive potential of AI-native models, rewarding companies that create the building blocks that enable true autonomy into their core architectures and products.

What is Agentic AI in Enterprise Software

Agentic AI refers to software systems capable of understanding goals, reasoning over context, and autonomously executing tasks across applications and data environments. Unlike predictive or assistive AI, agentic systems combine perception, reasoning, planning, and action in closed feedback loops.

• The overall Enterprise Software segment looks healthy with growth, margin and multiples having normalised and poised for growth 
• AI premiums are already visible: companies built for agents command valuation multiples roughly 30% higher than traditional SaaS peers, as investors re-rate software markets—median SaaS valuations sit around 6.7× ARR (vs. 4.7× long-term), while AI-native firms consistently trade above 8.0×, reflecting expectations of structurally higher growth and defensibility
• Business Process Management segment (BPM) sends mixed signals though, with strong historic and expected growth but multiples not reflecting the growth prospects and margin potential of the sector
• Our market insight and research based on historic and current mandates in the BPM space indicates that there is an increasing battle and insecurity among the future role of BPM as a potential area for disruption, with a very urgent need to successfully evolve into Agentic BPM (ABPM), the orchestration layer that enables agents to manage processes end-to-end
• Traditional SaaS providers must transform or risk being bypassed in the agent-driven economy, a shift of valuation metrics and redefinition of KPIs is already underway
• The shift also creates white space for vendors operating near the BPM core and for new entrants that master the enabling layers of agentic AI — from orchestration and governance to frictionless end-user delivery.
• Next to the usual US incumbents, European and German champions are uniquely positioned — but must act decisively
• Sovereignty concerns may play to the advantage of Europe and create opportunity as well as strong incumbents in the European and particularly German Business Process space, serving primarily industries that are very process heavy

Our thesis: The future of Enterprise Software goes beyond incremental AI add-ons — it is a re-architecting around agents. The winners will master context, orchestration, outcome-based economics, and the governance of autonomous systems. And most importantly the ultimate agentic software delivery to the end user, which is going to be orders of magnitude more complex than delivering just software.