In boardrooms around the globe, one topic has surged to the top of the agenda: how to make AI pay for itself. The opportunity to apply different AI use cases is boundless, but capturing real ROI calls for following the trail of cash flow.
A recent Icertis survey of more than 1,000 C-suite executives reveals that 83 percent of senior leaders now regard AI agents that manage business relationships (customers, suppliers, partners) as a top-priority AI use case.
Even more compelling: 53 percent believe these agents will negotiate customer or supplier deals on behalf of their enterprise within the next 12 months, and another 34 percent expect it within one to three years.
Why? Every business relationship is captured in a contract that determines the ebb and flow of money in and out. Forward-thinking leaders are having an aha moment about the huge potential for contract data to inform AI decision making.
These insights point to something bigger than incremental process automation—what we’re witnessing is a tectonic shift in how business gets done. From drafting and approval to negotiation and enforcement, the humble contract is being elevated, digitized and transformed. And AI agents are at the center.
From time trap to ROI runway
One of the enduring blind-spots of enterprise operations is that contracts—those legalese-laden documents sitting in shared drives or e-mail attachments—still command serious time and cost. In Icertis’s survey, 40 percent of C-suite leaders admit to spending more than 10 hours per week reading, reviewing, and approving contracts—a total of over 21 business days per year.
The annual volume is also staggering: Over half of executives review and approve 500+ contracts per year, and nearly 20 percent exceed 1,000.
This survey is more than just a curiosity—it’s a clarion call. The conversation is shifting from how do we make contract management less painful to how do we make contract management a strategic lever for business value? Because when you can convert those hundreds (or thousands) of agreements from static obligations into dynamic workflows, you unlock much more than cost savings—you unlock opportunity.
Why now? Agentic AI meets contract intelligence
Generative AI continues to make headlines, but as consultants at McKinsey note, the real business turning point is the transition from reactive AI (assistants, copilots) to agentic AI—systems that can autonomously plan, act, and integrate across the enterprise.
In the context of contracting, connectivity matters because contracts aren’t just legal artifacts, they are the rules of commerce: payment terms, service obligations, risk allocations, escalation protocols. Embedding those rules into AI-driven workflows means you move from “assist humans in reviewing contracts” to “autonomously execute contract-derived actions.”
For those who believe contracting is still too intricate or human-centric for AI, today’s environment is demanding a rethink.
The trust + guardrail imperative
This acceleration isn’t without its tensions. The survey reveals that 56 percent of business leaders are very concerned about granting autonomy to AI agents without proper guardrails. Top risks cited include security & privacy threats (40 percent), decisions made without human approval (26 percent), and misinformation caused by inaccurate insights (18 percent).
This echoes broader market sentiment: According to PwC, while 75 percent of executives say AI agents will reshape the workplace more than the internet did, many cite skill gaps, governance maturity, and integration risk as critical obstacles.
Given the stakes—supplier negotiations, customer terms, cross-enterprise obligations—contract-centric agentic AI demands a foundation of trust, transparency, governance, and orchestration. Simply deploying an agent isn’t enough; it must be embedded into the “rules of business” captured in contracts, with visible audit trails and defined human-in-the-loop checkpoints. Contracts are the guardrails that allow agentic workflows to scale with confidence.
Strategic implications for core business
For leaders in procurement, legal and finance, several strategic implications emerge:
1. Reframe contracts as data assets.
Contracts are no longer just obligations—they’re decision-making triggers. When you have hundreds or thousands of contracts, each with embedded business logic, you have a rich data lake that can feed agent-driven workflows. This drives automated actions like restocking inventory based on demand fluctuation, adjusting supplier costs on inflation triggers, or issuing real-time customer discounts.
2. Link contracts to business outcomes, not just process savings.
The traditional ROI story for contract lifecycle management (CLM) has been about faster approvals and fewer errors. The next-gen story is about generating value. Positioning contract intelligence as a revenue driver aligns with what’s top of mind for your CFO—and General Counsel—in terms of growth, margin, risk and agility.
3. Prepare workforce readiness and cross-functional alignment.
Legal, procurement, and finance must be aligned. Two decades ago, finance played a central role in managing contracts, with one in three functions owning them directly. Today, that number has dropped to just one in ten—often sidelining finance from the very agreements that dictate capital allocations, risk, and cash flow.
What’s next—and what to watch for
So where does this all go from here? Several things to keep on your radar:
- Pilot to production: Many organizations still tread carefully. According to McKinsey, fewer than 10 percent of “vertical” use cases (e.g., function-specific) have scaled. Yet Icertis’ data—53 percent expecting agent-led deals in a year—suggests that contracting is now tipping into this next phase.
- Integration and orchestration matter. Agents driving real value must link to ERP, CLM, CRM, and supply chain systems. Siloed agents won’t cut it.
- Governance as an enabler. As agentic systems take on higher-stakes tasks, trust and transparency become competitive differentiators—not just compliance checkboxes.
- Human-agent symbiosis wins. Despite bold numbers, experts caution that human oversight remains essential—especially in legal and negotiation contexts where liability, nuance and judgment matter.
- Value beyond cost-avoidance. The real power emerges when contract-derived agents drive revenue acceleration, dynamic supplier engagements, and real-time margin optimization—not just faster sign-here workflows.
Final word
Big picture, we’re no longer talking about incremental change. We’re witnessing the emergence of a new operating model for enterprise contracting.
For organizations seeking to lead—not simply respond—the question is no longer if AI in contracting will matter but how you will move forward: the rules you encode, the workflows you redesign, the trust you build, and the value you unlock.
In other words: contracts are no longer the end of the deal. They are the beginning of enterprise intelligence.
Searching for ROI in the age of AI? Read more about how leaders are reconciling urgency with caution, and learn about Icertis Vera – a smarter AI for contracts.
