Six months ago, we wrote about AI leading a paradigm shift from software-as-a-service to service-as-software, where software is no longer simply a too

A System of Agents brings Service-as-Software to life

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2024-11-01 06:30:04

Six months ago, we wrote about AI leading a paradigm shift from software-as-a-service to service-as-software, where software is no longer simply a tool for organizing work; software becomes the worker itself, capable of understanding, executing, and improving upon traditionally human-delivered services. The shift represents a technical evolution and also a reimagining of software programs: what was once a tool for guiding human services is now the service provider. The market opportunity in this transformation is enormous—$4.6 trillion in the next five years —as AI begins to eat into in-house salaries and outsourced services.

We’ve since engaged with hundreds of startups racing to use AI to reshape traditional service industries, from sales outreach to recruiting to IT services. Their collective efforts, especially in sectors with low software penetration, like insurance and legal, have revealed the next crucial question: What does it actually mean to translate human services into AI-powered software? How does the service-as-software idea get put into action? Here is how we see software evolving from simple workflow automation to a System of Agents. 

In the SaaS era, startups built software to assist humans with workflows of varying complexity, a model that fueled enterprise growth for decades. Salesforce is the archetypal example of such a System of Record. 

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