Economist study: enterprise procurement enters the agentic AI era

Economist Enterprise has published the fifth consecutive edition of its Procurement Imperative research, sponsored by SAP. The latest study, “Procurement at a Crossroads: From Optimism to Realism”, surveyed 2,648 C-suite executives across 23 countries, examining how procurement leaders are responding to pressures ranging from cost control and geopolitical volatility to the rapid advance of artificial intelligence.

What makes this year’s edition notable is its five-year lens: procurement has not followed a simple path from tactical to strategic. Its mandate has broadened, but so has the expectation to prove value — control cost, anticipate risk, strengthen supply continuity, and turn technology investment into measurable outcomes.

Cost never left the job description

In 2022, procurement leaders were still operating in the shadow of the pandemic. Supply chain risk ranked as the leading organizational risk, and COVID-19 disruption was the top driver of digital transformation. As conditions changed, the agenda expanded to resilience, visibility, supplier diversification, and digitalization — but cost never disappeared.

In the 2026 study, 54% of executives identify cost savings and optimization as procurement’s primary contribution to the organization. That is not a retreat: modern cost management requires understanding demand, supplier economics, working capital, risk, and the operational consequences of commercial decisions. Procurement’s cost mandate has become more sophisticated, not less important.

Digital transformation has moved from funding to execution

One of the clearest changes is what now stands in the way of transformation. In 2022, budget was the leading barrier at 30.2%. By 2026, it had dropped to fourth place, while ease of deployment became the primary concern of 71.7% of executives — a category that did not even exist as a response option in 2022.

The conversation has moved past “Can we afford it?” to “Can we actually implement it?” Procurement leaders are now challenged to embed technology across real processes, data environments, and organizations — and to generate repeatable business value from it.

Agentic AI has raised both the opportunity and the standard

The scale of the AI shift is unmistakable: 60% of executives name digital transformation as procurement’s top strategic priority for the next 12 to 18 months, up sharply from 38% in 2025, with agentic AI emerging as the most sought-after near-term technology.

But enthusiasm is now accompanied by greater scrutiny. As AI enters category management, intake, sourcing, and other workflows, procurement leaders need to be clear about the business outcome being improved, the data required, and the controls governing how AI acts.

The five-year view shows how quickly expectations have advanced. In 2022, digital technology broadly led the category-management improvement agenda at 35.8%. By 2023 and 2024, priorities grew more specific — cost analysis, scenario planning, and data quality. By 2026, AI-driven and predictive insight is the dominant priority, cited by 66.6% of respondents. Technology is shifting from helping professionals find information toward helping them interpret choices and execute defined tasks.

Strategic influence is becoming more operational

For years, procurement leaders have talked about earning a “seat at the table”. But the research suggests where procurement sits on the organizational chart may be becoming a less useful measure of its strategic influence. In 2022, the COO was already the largest reporting line at 33.5%, with the CFO close behind at 29.3%. By 2026, the COO share has risen to 44%, the CFO stands at 24.4%, and direct reporting to the CEO has declined from 18.8% to 15.7%.

Procurement’s strategic relevance is increasingly expressed through operational execution — improving decisions across cost, supply, risk, and technology. Yet greater integration does not automatically guarantee a sustained strategic role: executive confidence in procurement’s influence over digital transformation fell from 91% in 2025 to 68% in 2026. A seat at the table matters less than what procurement delivers once it is there.

The skills equation has changed

In 2022, skills gaps were relatively dispersed across technology (34.6%), category knowledge (32.0%), risk management (26.8%), and customer experience (25.6%). By 2025, AI proficiency and ethics had emerged as the leading skills priority at 68.2%, far ahead of traditional procurement competencies at 34.1%.

Strikingly, in that same 2025 research, curiosity was prioritized by just 10% of respondents — in contrast to what procurement leaders increasingly describe as the skill that will separate teams that thrive in the AI era from those that merely use the technology. Traditional procurement expertise is not obsolete; if anything, more capable technology increases the value of professionals who understand categories, suppliers, markets, and organizational change. AI fluency on its own is not enough.

The next chapter is about proof

Five years ago, procurement transformation was heavily shaped by external shocks. Today, organizations are making more deliberate choices about AI, analytics, talent, and operating models while being asked to deliver savings, manage volatility, and improve productivity simultaneously.

For businesses running ERP systems or weighing digital transformation of procurement processes, the message from this research is clear: value no longer lies in whether you have AI tools, but in your ability to connect data, embed technology into real processes, and measure outcomes. The procurement professional of the next five years will need to know not only how to use new tools, but when to challenge their outputs, how to apply business context, and where human judgment still matters most.

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Source: Five Years of Procurement Change: From Digital Ambition to Measurable Value — SAP News Center, September 17, 2026