New Delhi, April 15 -- US-based enterprise software firm ServiceNow is betting big on agentic artificial intelligence (AI) as its next area of growth and also hails India as one of its fastest-growing markets outside the US. Agentic AI, where agents significantly influence human operations, is expected to become a major technological frontier, with a projected market size of around $47 billion by 2030, up from $5 billion last year.
In his recent visit to India, Paul Smith, President of global Customer and Field Operations, at ServiceNow told TechCircle, "India is projected to be the world's third-largest economy by the end of 2027, and I anticipate ServiceNow India's growth to be in the triple digits during that period."
Almost 20% - or more than 5,200 of ServiceNow's 27,000 employees - is based out of its engineering centres in Bengaluru and Hyderabad with 40% of the product engineering work being done out of the country.
"ServiceNow's India engineering team has grown at an average annual rate of 25% and 85% of our Indian team are engineers or developers and a significant number of these engineers are working on leading-edge research around AI, particularly agentic AI," said Smith, adding that these teams are developing AI studios and low-code tools to help customers build AI agents, and contributing to cybersecurity, incident management, and user experience enhancements, among other innovative projects.
For ServiceNow, financial services and banking remain its largest growth segment in India, closely followed by manufacturing, telecom, and government. Smith said the company's triple-digit growth for its India business, will be driven by these verticals.
"With four of the five largest banks already utilising ServiceNow platforms, the company anticipates securing all top five banks as customers within the next few months," said Smith. The company recently gained a new business from mid-sized firms like Poonawalla Fincorp.
ServiceNow has also expanded its partner ecosystem in India, collaborating with firms like Wipro, Infosys, LTI Mindtree, and Hexaware, alongside global giants like Accenture and Deloitte. Smith said that LTIMindtree and Hexaware are recent examples of successful AI adoption on the platform, with LTIMindtree experiencing a 30% increase in developer productivity using Now Assist AI solutions.
On the company's recent acquisition strategy, Smith said, ServiceNow's acquisition strategy prioritises customer value, as demonstrated by the Moveworks and logic.ai acquisitions, leveraging logic.ai's AI and agentic AI innovation.
Globally too, ServiceNow's AI is being used extensively for proactive service monitoring. For example, Smith said, agentic AI agents monitor the Vodafone network to improve customer experience, and BT, with Airtel as a major shareholder, uses ServiceNow AI to resolve customer calls 55% faster. Siemens is using ServiceNow AI to automate approximately a million hours of human labour, freeing up employees to focus on higher-value tasks. "While the potential economic impact is significant, the success individual companies are experiencing is compelling," he said.
Quoting an International Data Corporation (IDC) report, Smith said that AI will drive $20 trillion in global economic value by 2030, while McKinsey forecasts $4 trillion within the next two years. More tangibly, customers are already experiencing up to 50% productivity gains through both generative and agentic AI on the ServiceNow platform.
Despite the global uncertainty, Smith believes that over the past five years, customers have consistently asked us how to increase efficiency. "Even before GenAI, the focus has been on automating businesses and workflows for predictability, productivity, and better employee/customer experiences. This trend is accelerating. Regardless of economic uncertainty, the underlying need is for efficiency. ServiceNow is well-positioned to help customers achieve this, making them resilient," he mentioned.
"We've seen success with Indian companies using us for IT service management and employee service management. The rapid acceleration will be in Customer Relationship Management (CRM), AI, and Agentic AI, which will automate manual processes," he said.
Of the top priorities for India in the next 12-18 months, Smith said, "Technology-wise, India remains a core R&D focus, with the Indian engineering team developing AI-driven innovations like "text to workflow" and "text to app." Go-to-market priorities include manufacturing, Telco, and government, along with public affairs."
"Some of our major focus is helping customers leverage the AI platform's potential, with continued investment in engineering and a focus on growing existing customers, acquiring new logos, and enabling GenAI and Agentic AI adoption," he summed up.
Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from TechCircle.