Most biz leaders believe orgn data must be modernised to use AI

About 89 per cent of India’s data and analytics leaders believe their organisations must modernise their data strategies for AI to deliver meaningful impact. While 75 per cent of business leaders are under increasing pressure to drive business value with data, the report highlights that incomplete, outdated, and poor-quality data remains their biggest barrier. This gap between data ambition and data reality becomes even more critical in the agentic AI era, according to a report.

To close the gap, savvy technical leaders are focusing on the fundamentals: timely, context-rich data, stronger governance and zero copy architectures that unlock trapped, distributed data regardless of where it resides. On their journey to becoming agentic enterprises, they’re also embracing emerging solutions like agentic analytics, that bring reliable insights into the flow of work.

Deepu Chacko, VP - Solution Engineering at Salesforce India, said: “AI cannot fix what incomplete data creates. For India to truly unlock the promise of agentic AI, leaders must treat data as a strategic asset — unified, governed, and contextual. The companies that modernize their data foundations today will be the ones that scale AI responsibly and lead the economy tomorrow. Agentic AI isn’t the next technology — it's the next revolution. AI agents handle routine tasks so humans can focus on creativity, relationships, and impact”.

Key data from the report:

Existing data foundations strain to support business ambitions: Nearly two-thirds of business leaders (66 per cent) describe their organisations as data-driven. Yet just as many (52 per cent) data and analytics leaders say their companies struggle to drive business priorities with data, exposing a gap between data maturity perceptions and reality.

About half (51 per cent) of business leaders say they can reliably generate timely insights.