Artificial intelligence (AI) is gaining traction across the business-to-business (B2B) community. In 2026, the sector is expected to experience deeper integration of AI across operations, in addition to heightened attention to governance, human expertise, and the strategic use of AI agents, according to a prediction guide by market research firm Forrester.

The guide, released in late-2025, outlines the trends that will shape the operating environment for B2B marketers, salespeople, and product leaders in 2026. It highlights both the expanding role of AI in payment workflows and pricing negotiations, but also the emerging risks that accompany rapid adoption.

GenAI incident losses surge

Across B2B teams, genAI has become pervasive. The rapid rollout of new solutions, often featuring untested functionalities, combined with lagging AI user skills, is expected to drive a sharp rise in incidents.

Forrester projects that these incidents will lead to the loss of more than US$10 billion in enterprise value. This decline will stem from declining stock prices, legal settlements, and fines, underscoring the financial toll of poorly governed genAI deployments.

Use of genAI has reached new heights. Roughly three-quarters of sales representatives now rely on AI-enabled sales tools at work. Additionally, half of B2B marketing decision-makers report their organization is experimenting with or currently using genAl, and 53% of product management leaders incorporate genAl technology in their product development process.

Human expertise remains essential

Though buyers increasingly view genAI tools as a meaningful interaction type during the final commit stage of their purchase, they will continue to seek human experts to validate insights and answer complex questions.

Human specialists provide the depth of understanding that genAI cannot yet replicate, ensuring that products function as expected. These experts will continue to be prominent in the buying process, and providers will need to upskill their own human resources, such as product experts and customer success teams, to deliver deep insights to buyers.

AI agents in B2B payments

Another key trend highlighted by Forrester is the rise of agentic AI in B2B payments. According to the report, B2B payments are especially suited to agentic AI because the complex part of B2B payments isn’t sending the money, but handling the adjacent processes, including creating invoices, checking them, approving payments, updating accounting records, and managing payment terms. These tasks are repetitive, rule-based, and already digital, which makes them easy for AI agents to automate.

In addition, B2B payments usually involve established business relationships than consumer payments, with fewer trust or authentication hurdles.

By the end of 2026, Forrester expects AI will be used in about one-third of B2B payment workflows. This come as vendors including Basware, Coupa, HighRadius, and Ramp are accelerating the development of AI agents to address corporate spend and B2B payment use cases.

Agent-led quote negotiations

Forrester also predicts that in the near future, AI agents will start negotiating deals between businesses. In 2026, at least one in five B2B sellers is expected to respond to AI‑powered buyer agents with dynamically delivered counteroffers via seller-controlled agents, showcasing that AI-driven negotiations are steadily becoming a mainstream component of B2B commerce.

This shift is also forcing procurement and sales team to develop agents to aggressively negotiate discounts, payment terms, and service levels.

In 2025, 61% of purchase influencers said their organization has or will use a private genAl engine to support purchasing, reinforcing the momentum behind AI-driven negotiation.

B2B leaders have rapidly embraced genAI, attracted by the potential of the technology to enhance every stage of the deal cycle, including awareness, outreach, engagement and acquisition.

According to McKinsey’s 2024 B2B Pulse Survey of B2B decision-makers, 19% of respondents had already implemented genAI use cases for B2B buying and selling, with another 23% being in the process of doing so. McKinsey estimates that teams that combine genAI with personalization approaches are 1.7 times more likely to increase market share than those that are not fully committed to either.

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