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Zendesk to acquire Forethought in major agentic AI play
Zendesk is acquiring Forethought to bolster its agentic AI chops with specialised and self-learning AI agents capable of managing complex customer service workflows
Customer service software giant Zendesk has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Forethought as it looks to boost the capabilities of its artificial intelligence (AI) agents, which the company expects will handle more customer interactions than human agents this year.
Through the proposed acquisition, which Computer Weekly understands is Zendesk’s largest in two decades, Forethought’s self-improving AI will be integrated into Zendesk’s Resolution platform, allowing AI agents to generate, adapt and execute complex workflows across different service channels.
“The era of simply managing conversations is over,” said Tom Eggemeier, Zendesk CEO. “The future of customer experience requires agentic capabilities built for definitive resolution. Forethought’s advanced capabilities perfectly align with our vision for agentic service. Together, we will be scaling self-improving AI that learns from every interaction. But technology is just the means. Resolution is our identity, and loyalty is the outcome.”
Zendesk’s AI agents can learn from customer conversations without the need for manual retraining, working in tandem with human agents to resolve over 80% of routine interactions today. With Forethought, Zendesk will be able to provide specialised AI agents for business-to-business, consumer and employee use cases, as well as native voice automation.
Notably, the Forethought platform will extend AI into existing enterprise systems even where application programming interfaces (APIs) do not exist, eliminating manual work and unlocking previously unreachable workflows.
Sami Ghoche, co-founder and CEO of Forethought, noted that joining Zendesk was the fastest way to accelerate the startup’s mission to transform customer experience for every business.
“With Zendesk’s platform, resources and global reach, we will bring our technology to many more organisations around the world, move faster on innovation and continue pushing the boundaries of what AI can do in customer experience,” he said.
The agentic AI acquisition wave
The proposed buyout of Forethought is the latest in an aggressive consolidation phase across the enterprise software market as suppliers race to infuse agentic AI capabilities into their platforms.
Over 50 agentic AI acquisitions have been announced globally over the past two years, according to Zinnov, a management consulting firm. Zendesk’s chief rival, Salesforce, has heavily invested in this area, acquiring startups like Convergence.ai and Cimulate to power its Agentforce platform.
Meanwhile, IT service management software supplier ServiceNow spent nearly $2.85bn to acquire enterprise search and AI agent developer Moveworks last year, while customer experience supplier Nice acquired Cognigy for about $955m to bolster its CXone Mpower platform.
Zendesk itself is no stranger to the M&A rush. The Forethought deal follows the company’s 2024 acquisition of Finnish service automation provider Ultimate, which laid the groundwork for Zendesk’s current AI agent offerings. Last December, it also acquired Unleash, an AI-powered enterprise search platform, to shore up its employee service capabilities.
Keith Kirkpatrick, vice-president and research director at The Futurum Group, said that with the deal, Zendesk is making a bold statement that agentic AI will define the next era of customer experience. “At a time when many software companies are cautious or still in pilot mode, this investment reflects strong confidence in both the technology and the market’s readiness,” he added.
Chuck Ganapathi, CEO of Gainsight, a joint customer of both Zendesk and Forethought, noted that service must be autonomous and deeply integrated to deliver a world-class customer experience.
“For Gainsight, this deal will provide the sophisticated, cross-platform automation we need to ensure every customer interaction is intelligent, seamless and aligned with our broader mission for driving retention for our customers,” he said.
Zendesk said the Forethought acquisition will accelerate its product roadmap by over a year. Forethought will remain available to new customers without requiring them to use the core Zendesk platform. The transaction is expected to close by the end of March, subject to regulatory approvals.
Read more about agentic AI in APAC
- Singapore has launched a governance framework agentic AI systems to address the growing security and operational risks posed by AI agents.
- While firms in mature markets are using AI agents to automate routine tasks, those in emerging markets where the cost of the technology is higher than that of human labour are favouring revenue-generating use cases.
- Australian retail giant Wesfarmers has signed a multi-year deal with Google Cloud to deploy AI agents across its portfolio of brands, including Kmart, Officeworks, Priceline and OnePass.
- Microsoft is teaming up with four of India’s largest IT services companies to deploy agentic AI capabilities across enterprises.
