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For the last several years, enterprises have treated AI as something to test. A pilot here, a proof of concept there. That era is ending. According to new global DeepL research, a survey of 5,000 global executives on the impact of AI agents reshaping business, 69% expect AI agents to fundamentally change how their companies operate in 2026. Nearly half anticipate major transformation, while another quarter say that change is already underway. This moment didnt arrive overnight. While 2025 was the year agentic AI moved from theory to application, enterprises are making the shift structural this year. Leaders are no longer asking whether AI works but rather deciding where AI agents belong inside their operating model. As tools mature and agentic systems become capable of coordinating work across functions, AI agents are unlocking new opportunitiesnot just automating tasks. By eliminating manual coordination, AI agents enable organizations to move faster and smarter, enabling the creativity, problem-solving depth, and judgment that turn velocity into measurable value. Yet, when it comes to scaling agents and validating their investment, most organizations remain stuck in pilot mode. McKinsey reports that while 62% of companies are experimenting with agents, only 10% are scaling them across a single function, and just 32% of leaders report an impact on EBIT at the enterprise level. The gap between early adopters and those who hold out will widen in 2026not because of trial and error, but execution. Three shifts will define this gaphow enterprises automate core operations, deploy AI for growth, and build the communication infrastructure agents require. AUTOMATE THE CORE AI agents are no longer confined to experimentation or pilots. Enterprises are deploying them into operational workflows like processing returns in customer service, investigating customer complaints, automating approvals and ticketing, supporting prospect and competitor research in sales and marketing, and optimizing working capital in finance. Whats changing is continuity. Instead of accelerating individual tasks, organizations are increasingly making agents responsible for managing handoffs between themreducing friction. Looking at AI agent adoption more broadly, DeepLs research shows global executives cite proven ROI and efficiency (22%), workforce adaptability (18%), and enterprise readiness (18%) as the primary reasons they feel confident expanding agent deployment. Results, not optimism, are driving this shift. At the same time, known barriers are beginning to soften. Cost (16%), workforce preparedness (13%), and technology maturity (12%) remain challenges, but enterprises are actively addressing them as they gain experience operating agents in production environments. The real risk now is inaction. Organizations that fail to identify which workflows should be automated first keep valuable talent focused on low-leverage workwhile competitors redesign operations around intelligent systems. Customer service offers a clear example. Companies like Perk are deploying AI agents to take on routine operational work in customer support, while human agents focus on complex, relationship-driven scenarios. As Tom Davis, senior director of operational excellence at Perk, notes: When weve got travelers stuck in airports, we want our humans focused on those momentsand in the background, a machine of AI handling the grunt work. That division allows human agents to focus on high-stakes relationship work while AI agents manage operational tasks at scale. AI AS A GROWTH ENGINE AI is no longer confined to cost reduction. Its becoming a driver of growth. The broader AI landscape shows strong momentum: 67% of executives reported measurable impact from AI initiatives in 2025, and 52% expect AI to contribute more to company growth than any other technology in 2026. Enterprises seeing the strongest returns are applying AI across revenue-generating functionscustomer service, marketing, sales, finance, legal, HR, and IT supportrather than limiting it to back-office automation. The competitive advantage comes from scale and integration, not just isolated use cases. But the real gain isnt just efficiencyits faster, higher-quality decision making. As b2ventures noted in their work with AI agents, the technology helps them make higher-quality investment decisions faster because agents excel at evaluating companies and surfacing insights that inform critical choices. According to DeepLs research, leaders in the UK (80%), Germany (78%), and the U.S. (71%) are seeing measurable performance gains from AI initiatives. This underscores that execution and organizational readiness are just as important as access to technology when it comes to turning AI into a strategic advantage. Ignoring AI in growth-critical areas is no longer conservative. Its a strategic risk, particularly in sectors where margins and customer expectations are shifting fast. LANGUAGE AND VOICE AI As AI agents move deeper into enterprise workflows, theyre changing how people interact with software itself. Instead of clicking through dashboards or submitting forms, employees increasingly instruct systems through natural language. In an agent-driven operating model, language becomes the primary user interface. This is the mechanism through which work gets done. That shift raises the stakes for fluency and accuracy. When language is the interface, a mistranslated prompt or misunderstood instruction doesnt just slow down communication; it can derail an entire workflow. For enterprises scaling agents across teams and regions, language precision becomes a requirement, not a nice-to-have. This is reflected in enterprise priorities where 64% of companies plan to increase investment in language AI in 2026, while organizations expect adoption of real-time voice translation to rise to 54%. These investments arent standalone initiatives. They are foundational to making AI agents reliable, scalable, and effective. EXECUTION, NOT EXPERIMENTATION This year, the organizations experiencing the biggest impacts will stop experimenting with AI and start embedding AI agents into core operations and applying them across growth-critical functions. By turning AI into a strategic advantage, these companies will streamline operations, make better decisions, and unlock measurable business value. Those who delay will watch the gap grow as early adopters accelerate ahead. Jarek Kutylowski is the CEO and founder of DeepL.
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Before the holidays, Adam Conner began vibe coding. Like everyone else in the know, he was using Claude Code. Compared to popular chatbots, Anthropics advanced AI agent speaks the language of computers: code. Normally, you click buttons in browsers, open folders, and drag files. But you can also do so by codinginteracting with software by typing commands into a terminal, a text-based app. Claude Code goes beyond such primitive tasks, though: an AI that can code can effectively do nearly anything on a computer. We expected developers to use Claude Code for coding, but then something unexpected happened, an Anthropic spokesperson tells Fast Company. We started seeing the discovery arc where people would approach Claude Code to tackle a coding task, then have an ‘aha moment’ when they realized it could help with other tasks. The result of that aha moment is a vibe coding phenomenon that lets developersand, crucially, non-developers such as Connerharness the AI agent to write code and create projects that could grow tomato plants, knit sweaters, and build fully fledged iOS apps in hours. Conners vibe coding wasnt as dramatic as keeping living organisms alive, but no less impressive. He used it for his work: an AI labor market simulator, built from Bureau of Labor Statistics and Federal Reserve data. It projects the potential impact that AI could have on the economy. (Headline: its pretty big.) I got it running in a day, says Conner, whos also the vice president for technology policy at the Center of American Progress (CAP), a think-tank. It shows how this AI is more accessible and powerful. You can have limited programming experience, and still build something quickly. But the real revelation, says Conner, came using Claude Code to form his own policy council: 21 AI agents with competing ideologies and political agendas. Within minutes, it had generated 24-page proposal papers, 12-page draft legislations, and hundreds of policy ideas. You can now direct a small army of bots to do the tasks of humans relatively quickly, says Conner. Its not yet the game changer that can fully automate someones job, but you can begin to see how AI could be transformational. Were now in the fourth year of widely available generative AI tools. As adoption has ticked up23% of U.S. workers are now frequent AI users, nearly doubling year-over-yearso too have AI-related layoffs. Despite many companies citing AI as the cause for layoffs, though, actual mass job displacement due to AI has yet to materialize. But the capabilities of Anthropics Claude Codeand in particular its advanced AI workplace tool, Claude Coworkcould change that. The new knowledge worker So far, generative AIs use case has been split fairly equally between work and personal needs, such as generating ideas, editing, and even companionship. In 2025, bots were more often leveraged for therapy, life coaching, and, increasingly, codingthe latter likely driven by the popularity of Claude Code: generating more than $1 billion in revenue, just six months after general availability, according to Anthropic. On January 12, the San Francisco-headquartered company launched Claude Cowork. Its effectively a UI update to Code for the mass market. Whereas Code can only be utilized through a terminals command linethe barebones essence of human-to-computer interactionCowork adds the friendly, compliant chatbot layer to the Claude desktop app. Currently, anyone with a $100-per-month Claude Max subscription can prompt the AI to complete nearly any computer-related task. Compared to popular chatbots like ChatGPT, Perplexity, or the original Claude.ai, Cowork can, in theory, leverage users hard drivestheir digital livesin its working memory. In practice, as a workplace tool, Cowork can organize haystacks of files into neat, delineated folders; turn screenshots of invoices into actionable spreadsheets; pull material from multiple websites, synthesized and analyzed in a single document; and even action slide comments. In short, its a general AI assistant, built for knowledge work. Its like having a junior researcher thats proactive, makes few mistakes, and solves problems before you realize there even was one, says Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, professor of business psychology at University College London and Fast Company contributor whos written books about AI. Compared to other AI platforms, Cowork is smarter and more autonomous, he adds. In contrast to how people typically use ChatGPToften for their personal lives, such as travel plans, self-therapy, or recipesAnthropics latest agent can be more entrusted with their work. I use Cowork to digest research: Upload this folder and create a review of these articles main points, then look online for everything Ive written on this topic. So you can give it multi-layered tasks and receive highly accurate outputs, says Chamorro-Premuzic. These sorts of tasksbite-sized chunks of reading, researching, and writingare traditionally delegated to entry-level employees, says Conner. Its how knowledge workers judgment and expertise is honed on their gradual climb up the career ladder. If AI takes over some of those junior-level processes, it could pull the ladder up from them, he adds. The risk is that the effectiveness of AI agents like Cowork, and their widespread adoption, could impact entry-level hiring, continues Conner. This has long-term consequences for the economy. And in some ways, its already impacted how many entry-level jobs are available right now; some data suggests a 35% plummet in entry-level openings in the U.S. since 2023. Fewer junior roles eventually leads to fewer qualified candidates for mid-level and senior roles, Conner says. So, while short-term financial focus means some companies may want to adopt AI more and hire fewer junior folks, its possible we look back years from now and realize it hurt the talent pipeline. Coding the future Cowork has already deeply impacted the economy, just over a month after launch. p>On February 3, $300 billion was wiped from software and data stocks. It swiftly followed Anthropics release of plug-ins that can tailor Cowork to specific roles across sales, legal, financial analysis, and other industries. The worry is that if in-house lawyers can just use Cowork to do their work, they no longer need legal software, says Chamorro-Premuzic. He believes Cowork is an incremental upgrade, rather than exponential. But the next iteration will likely come soon. On February 5, Anthropic released Claude Opus 4.6. It has four times the effective recall of Opus 4.5, its predecessor that made Claude Code go virallaunched just 73 days before. The pace of release is accelerating (Sonnet 4.6, Anthropics free model, was released on February 17). Thats not just because of the AI raceClaude Code already writes 90% of its teams code. On December 27, its lead developer said all 40,000 lines of new code hed contributed in the past 30 days were written by the agentic tool. An autonomous, self-perpetuating feedback loop means the next upgrade is always imminent. We’re going to see AI involved in improving and building itself more and more, says an Anthropic spokesperson. In the closer term, Claude Code helps people build faster, with fewer resources, and the result is innovation across entire industries. We’re in the early innings of what’s possible. Claude Cowork isnt perfect. It requires oversight, particularly with high-stakes tasks. Like all AI, it can also make mistakesand given it can have access to personal files, apps, and tools, those errors can be more widespread than a chatbots text output. Its also not compliant first: conversation histories are stored locally, rather than within tightly regulated workflows. However, mass adoption of advanced AI tools like Cowork will likely be inevitable. So will labor market displacementits only the extent thats unclear. There are already signs that junior workers and college graduates are disproportionately affected by the onward march of AI. A November 2025 Stanford University study found a 16% relative decline in employment for early-career workers in occupations most exposed to the technology since 2022, such as software developers and customer service representatives. Not all entry-level jobs will be decimated by AI. Companies will always want to hire the best talent, and train them over time to accumulate institutional knowledge, workplace culture, and project history in ways technology cant. But there are concerns over how roles may be reshaped. If knowledge work merely becomes entering and fine-tuning prompts, it risks workers automating themselves, hampering their development and soft skills. Generative AI can tell you what to say in giving critical feedback, but its not the same as having a hard conversation and learning from it, says Chamorro-Premuzic. It becomes judgment without experience. The power of Claude Cowork means were one step closer to that future. Its like seeing the Wright brothers fly for the first time, says Conner. You wouldnt have understood the concept of a Boeing 767 flying across the ocean, but youd have grasped the idea of aviation. With Claude Cowork, you can see the future more clearly, and how this technology will have a major impact.
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Bourbon was once hailed as the poor mans drink. The spirit has since developed, however, from a mass-market American staple into a luxury class, and limited releases, higher prices, and brands vying for prestige have caused a crowded top tier. Even though the premium field has widened, the very top of the market remains stubbornly narrow, according to whiskey expert Fred Minnick. During a blind tasting of his top 100 American whiskeys of 2025, Minnick evaluated leading contenders anonymously. Even without labels, the rankings reflected the same hierarchy seen at retail and on the secondary market. The most scarce, high-status bottles still rose to the top, regardless of brand recognition. George T. Stagg claimed the number one spot, followed by Sazerac Rye 18 Year at number two. Both are part of the Buffalo Trace Antique Collection, one of the most limited and consistently in-demand product lines in American spirits. Buffalo Trace, beyond its Antique Collection, also produces the popularand often hard to findEagle Rare, Blantons, Weller, and Pappy Van Winkle whiskey brands. Minnicks ranking reinforced a key dynamic shaping the bourbon market. While dozens of producers now compete in the premium tier, demand continues to concentrate on a small set of legacy brands whose supply is structurally constrained by long aging cycles and finite inventory. Scarcity, not novelty, appears to be one of the most powerful differentiators at the top end. That scarcity has also shaped customer expectations. People who are out buying bourbon want to buy something that feels fancy, Minnick said, whos next book, Bottom Shelf, comes out next month. Bourbon, which used to be the poor mans drink, is now like a fancy mans drink. Those changing expectations are reflected not only in pricing and branding but in how elite bourbon is judged. Minnick noted that higher proof and longer finishonce defining markers of top-tier releasesno longer carry the same weight on their own. For the first time in my career, Im breaking protocol, he said. Im not rewarding the longer finish. Instead, Minnick favored the bourbon that delivered what he described as a fuller, more immersive experience, one that absolutely drenches my tongue and completely encompasses my entire mouth. While each bottle featured in Minnicks review is among the top American whiskeys, the most supply-constrained, prestige-driven brands still set the markets upper bound. And without labels, the qualities that signal luxury still held up under blind tasting. Check out the top five bottles below, and watch the full video on YouTube: George T. Stagg, Buffalo Trace Antique Collection Sazerac Rye 18 Year, Buffalo Trace Antique Collection Bombergers PFG Brother Justus Founders Reserve American Single Malt Heaven Hill 90th Anniversary Leila Sheridan This article originally appeared on Fast Companys sister website, Inc.com. Inc. is the voice of the American entrepreneur. We inspire, inform, and document the most fascinating people in business: the risk-takers, the innovators, and the ultra-driven go-getters that represent the most dynamic force in the American economy.
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