Salesforce sees annual results below estimates as Agentforce adoption lags

By Zaheer Kachwala

(Reuters) -Business software provider Salesforce forecast fiscal 2026 revenue below Wall Street expectations on Wednesday, weighed down by slower adoption of its Agentforce platform, sending shares of the company down around 5% in extended trading.

The software-as-a-service pioneer is banking heavily on AI agents to reinvigorate growth at a time when other cloud firms, including Microsoft and Amazon, have firmly established themselves as leaders in the sector while making strides in machine learning.

The downbeat forecast indicates that the spending environment remains pressured, with enterprises withholding new financial commitments owing to still-high interest rates and economic uncertainty.

"Given how poor initial generative AI experiments were for many companies, they're not just writing blank checks until Salesforce shows them Agentforce actually works," said Rebecca Wettemann, CEO of industry analyst firm Valoir.

"The next quarter or two will be critical for Salesforce."

The company expects revenue to be between $40.5 billion and $40.9 billion, compared to the average analysts' estimate of $41.35 billion, according to data compiled by LSEG.

It forecast full-year adjusted earnings per share between $11.09 and $11.17 per share, compared with analysts' estimate of $11.18 per share.

Analysts have said that the company's return to double-digit growth rates hinges on the success of Agentforce — its AI agent builder platform — after it reported single-digit revenue growth in the past few quarters.

Parker Snook, senior research analyst at M Science, said that monetization for Agentforce "is maybe off to a slower start than what people have thought."

The emergence of AI agents reflects a shift in the booming artificial intelligence space, as tech firms are starting to transition beyond chatbots in a move to show returns on the billions they have poured into this revolutionary technology.

The company's fourth-quarter revenue came in at $9.99 billion, missing a consensus estimate of $10.04 billion.

(Reporting by Zaheer Kachwala in Bengaluru; Editing by Alan Barona)

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