How AI agents are shaping the future of finance

AI agents may soon surpass human application users as software vendors rethink the user experience to account for the growing digital workforce. This bold prediction from Accenture should get every finance leader thinking about how work will be accomplished during the next few years.

According to a recent McKinsey study, 85% of CFOs believe that “creating insights that reduce manual analysis” is the most valuable aspect AI will bring to their businesses during the next five years, closely followed by “improving employees’ productivity” (83%).

Keith Causey, senior vice president of cloud ERP transformation and development at Oracle, believes gaining the most value from predictive, generative, and agentic AI will require CFOs to change the way they look at things.

“AI-driven finance is not just about process improvement; it represents a new mindset for CFOs. AI agents may achieve outcomes beyond what your current capabilities can deliver, allowing you to laser-focus on operational efficiency and business results,” said Causey.

DEFINING AI AGENTS AND PREDICTING THEIR IMPACT

Definitions of AI agents differ across organizations and industries, but most commentators agree that agents can proactively complete tasks within an application, or multiple applications, and are guided by specific goals and objectives.

“AI agents offer multidimensional capabilities that can execute end-to-end processes with little human intervention,” said Causey.

When asked about AI agents in finance, Causey outlined numerous use cases that Oracle Cloud ERP’s development team is working on to help reduce manual processes for finance professionals.

“We’re working on embedding agents that can be deployed to automate data ingestion and document creation for billing, accounting, and recordkeeping. This includes many workflows such as procure-to-pay processes, expense receipt itemization, supplier invoice processing, bank reconciliations, and journal entry creation,” added Causey.

He also outlined use cases where agents can help perform reconciliations, create journal entries, match invoice information, provide recommended payment options to optimize working capital, provide real-time financial predictions, and deliver valuable business insights.

With the addition of AI agents, Causey believes that the finance function is now dynamic, real-time, and continuous.

“AI-driven finance helps enable touchless operations, predictive insights, and collaborative actions, driving unparalleled efficiency and business understanding,” noted Causey.

The Power of a Unified Suite and the Right AI Partner

According to Bob Evans, cofounder and analyst at Acceleration Economy, integration fatigue, user experience, security, and AI’s need for speed are all driving the market away from point solutions and towards application suites.

“Unified suites act as fuel for AI. Businesses today face an intense, rapid, and unrelenting pace of operations. The old model of taking applications from multiple vendors and spending time and money to integrate them internally is no longer sustainable,” said Evans.

Fortune 500 mutual insurance company, Guardian Life Insurance Company of America (Guardian), has used Oracle Cloud ERP to enable its finance team to leverage the latest AI innovations.

“We needed to standardize our finance data and processes to expand insights, increase efficiency, and deliver more value to our business teams. With our core financials in the cloud and a complete view of our data, we can embrace Oracle’s embedded AI capabilities to further increase productivity,” said Marcel Esqueu, vice president of financial systems transformation at Guardian.

Industry experts predict that by 2028, 33% of enterprise software applications will include agentic AI, up from less than 1% in 2024, enabling 15% of day-to-day work decisions to be made autonomously.

Recent analyst reports attest to the power of a full suite and the strength of Oracle Cloud ERP as customers across all industries leverage AI agents to transform finance operations. In late 2024, Oracle Fusion Cloud Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) was named a leader in three finance-specific reports.

According to Albert Pang, president of technology market research company Apps Run the World, Oracle Cloud ERP has proven to be formidable in sustaining its lead in the ERP market.

“Oracle Cloud ERP’s recognition is a testament to the strength of its solutions, its commitment to helping its customers revolutionize processes and workflows, and its ability to execute on its vision for AI-driven finance,” said Pang.

Oracle’s AI Advantage

An important factor in determining whether business software will be able to meet the high expectations of CFOs and business leaders in the AI era is the quality of enterprise data and the performance of infrastructure services.

Steve Miranda, executive vice president of applications development at Oracle, recently outlined what many see as an advantage Oracle has over other software vendors in the AI race.

“We are the only enterprise vendor to offer a fully integrated technology stack, from hardware to database to infrastructure to applications, which fuels the fastest innovation cycle in the industry,” said Miranda.

With Oracle Fusion Applications on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI), Oracle has been able to deliver 100+ generative AI features and 50+ role-based AI agents, embedded end-to-end within its applications at no additional cost.

“Oracle already has a lead in traditional AI and is now taking the lead on generative AI with its AI agents as the only ERP vendor to use its own cloud infrastructure for its applications,” said Holger Mueller, vice president and principal analyst for Constellation Research.

The business impact organizations can realize with AI is only just beginning, and even at these early stages, many organizations are already proving the value of AI in finance.

Guardian’s Esqueu says finance organizations should be conscious of whether their systems and data can serve them adequately in the era of AI-powered finance.

 

“To avoid being left behind, organizations should prioritize cleaning up their data and partner with organizations that help deliver on the potential of AI,” said Esqueu.