AI agents surge in consumer-facing industries as adoption jumps 119%
Consumer industries lead 119% surge in AI agents as retail, travel see 128-133% monthly growth in automation—changing competitive landscape for product teams
ZDNET's Vala Afshar reports that AI agent creation among leading companies jumped 119% in the first half of 2025, with consumer-facing industries leading the charge. Retail businesses saw agent actions grow 128% monthly, while travel and hospitality hit 133% monthly growth. The data, from Salesforce's new Agentic Enterprise Index, shows employee interactions with AI agents growing 65% per month, and 94% of consumers now choose to interact with agents when given the option.
What this tells us: Industries with direct customer touchpoints are moving fastest because they can measure impact immediately through customer satisfaction and cost reduction. Travel, retail, hospitality, and financial services have clear incentives—handle more volume, reduce wait times, cut costs. For legal and product teams, this means regulatory scrutiny will focus on these sectors first, and competitive pressure will be most intense here. If you're building in consumer-facing spaces, you're not just competing with other products anymore—you're competing with the pace of AI adoption itself.
Vala Afshar
