Singapore, August 25, 2025 — UiPath (NYSE: PATH), a global leader in agentic automation, has commissioned a new IDC InfoBrief, “Agenttic Automation: Unlocking Seamless Orchestration for the Modern Enterprise,” which has revealed that approximately 42% of organisations in Southeast Asia (SEA) have already implemented agentic AI and that nearly 44% are planning to use the technology within the next year. The results are indicative of the increasing adoption of AI agents and a broader trend of organisations transitioning from AI experimentation to large-scale implementation, establishing 2025 as a critical year for AI integration in SEA.
South East Asia’s AI Growth Impetus
Businesses’ aspirations to enhance product and service quality, accelerate the development of new products, and improve employee productivity are the driving forces behind the transition to large-scale AI implementation. SEA organisations are also cognisant of the tangible advantages that agentic AI provides, as 75% of them report that it improves decision-making, and 72% report that it enhances productivity.
The adoption of agentic AI is being expedited by the increasing digital transformation of SEA and the necessity for more efficient, autonomous systems to support business operations and consumer engagement. The industries that have adopted agentic AI the most are financial services, manufacturing, retail, and wholesale. In 2025, SEA organisations rank customer support automation (58%), risk management and fraud detection (58%), and productivity enhancement (56%), as some of the most prospective use cases of agentic AI.
Navigating The Complexities of AI Implementation
Despite the fact that SEA countries have implemented a variety of AI initiatives, the region continues to encounter numerous obstacles in their pervasive implementation. Notably, the primary obstacles to the advancement of AI technologies in SEA are AI governance and risk management (22%), followed by a scarcity of trained professionals (18%) and high infrastructure costs (18%).
SEA organisations are apprehensive about the potential business risks that data privacy breaches (51%), security vulnerabilities due to their autonomous actions (48%), and unintended consequences deriving from complex interactions (47%) would pose. This is particularly true for agentic AI. Data security concerns (57%), high implementation costs (48%), and integration with existing systems (42%), are the primary obstacles to implementation.
Agentic Automation Paves the Way for Enterprise AI Adoption
The pace of agentic AI adoption in SEA continues to accelerate, despite the challenges. Despite the fact that they have not yet made substantial investments, approximately 79% of organisations are actively devising potential use cases for agentic AI.
Agentic automation, a critical enabler for AI-powered enterprises, is at the vanguard of this transformation. Organisations can unlock new levels of efficiency, scalability, and innovation by integrating the power of agentic AI and RPA into their enterprise workflows and deploying autonomous AI agents to manage complex tasks through agentic automation. Businesses are utilising agentic orchestration to dynamically manage workflows, scale agentic automation across the organisation, and interconnect isolated AI tasks to maximise impact.
DebDeep Sengupta, Area Vice President, South Asia, UiPath, stated, “Agentic automation is rapidly redefining business operations across Southeast Asia. While enterprises in this region are embracing the full potential of AI agents to streamline workflows and autonomously execute complex business processes, trust and security remain barriers to widespread implementation. Our agentic automation platform directly addresses these challenges, breaking down barriers to enterprise AI adoption by enhancing security and compliance, improving accuracy and reliability for agentic outcomes.”
Deepika Giri, Associate Vice President, AI Research IDC Asia/Pacific, added, “Becoming an AI-fueled business is no longer an option in today’s unpredictable climate. For many organisations, it’s fast becoming a strategic necessity. Across the region, organisations are embracing agentic AI and agentic automation at scale. It is clear that many leaders see its potential to drive unprecedented levels of productivity, innovation, and growth, which will be key in building organisational resilience against future disruptions.”
The Path Forward
As SEA organisations adopt agentic AI solutions, business leaders must prioritise the development of transparent human-agent ecosystems and the implementation of automation solutions that feature robust governance frameworks, transparent decision-making capabilities, and strict adherence to data security and privacy standards. Simultaneously, technology executives will be required to assess and identify the appropriate agentic tools, with a particular emphasis on platforms that are not only compatible with the organisation’s requirements but also seamlessly integrate with existing systems and applications.
The governance frameworks of SEA countries must be fortified with defined policies, standards, and regulatory guidelines for the ethical use of AI agents to ensure the responsible and effective deployment of these agents. Transparent risk management, comprehensive security measures, and targeted upskilling programmes are also necessary to address the talent shortage and foster public-private partnerships to reduce infrastructure costs, in addition to addressing data security, ethical concerns, and compliance challenges.
Download the IDC InfoBrief “Agentic Automation: Unlocking Seamless Orchestration for the Modern Enterprise.”
