Published on the 01/05/2025 | Written by Heather Wright

Show me the returns…

ERP customers might be saying yes to AI, but it’s technologies that deliver more immediate and tangible business value, such as web-commerce, that are outpacing the more hyped offerings of AI and predictive analytics.

Panorama Consulting’s 2025 ERP Report shows an increase in organisations deploying AI either ‘significantly’ or ‘moderately’, up from 53 percent to 73 percent.

“A web-commerce implementation… can drive customer engagement and revenue growth.”

The report, which is based on a small sample – just 172 companies, the majority being large multinationals (the median number of software licenses purchased was 150), shows the majority (61 percent) are pursuing what Panorama calls ‘ERP implementations’, where companies improve processes to fit the industry pre-configurations of their new offerings and are focused on stablising core business processes rather than more transformative ambitions.

It’s a trend the consulting company believes reflects economic uncertainty and talent shortages, especially for professionals skilled in managing end-to-end business transformations.

When it comes to AI, Panorama says there’s growing maturity in both the technology and organisations’ readiness to embrace it, though customers are wary that it’s still in its early stages and are keen to understand vendors’ plans before making the jump.

As highlighted in iStart’s 2025-26 ERP Buyers Guide the use cases for AI in ERP have been less obvious than for those in other areas such as CRM and online retail, but they are becoming clearer.

Panorama’s report shows 46 percent of respondents have deployed the technology ‘significantly’ as part of their ERP project while 27 percent say they’ve got ‘moderate’ deployment and 23 percent say they’re planning to deploy over the next two years.

The company highlights the relatively slow adoption of predictive analytics, ‘significantly’ deployed by 34 percent of respondents and ‘moderately’ deployed by 43 percent as illustrative of the typical trajectory of AI adoption.

“Adoption often begins with automation and chatbots (lower barriers to entry) and over time, some organisations develop the data maturity and integration capabilities required for predictive analytics.”

It’s web-commerce, however, that is the leading initiative deployed as part of respondents’ ERP projects, with 60 percent rating their deployment ‘significant’, and 26 percent saying it was moderate.

Chris Devault, Panorama senior manager of client services, says organisations are prioritising technologies which deliver more immediate and tangible business value.

With hyper-personalisation and omnichannel growth the name of the game for big names like Amazon, more organisations are implementing modern ERP systems and ensuring seamless integration with CRM, ecommerce platforms and digital marketing tools, in recognition that traditional ERP systems aren’t enough to provide the high level customer experience required today.

“A web-commerce implementation that aligns with an organisation’s overarching digital strategy and business goals can drive customer engagement and revenue growth,” Devault says.

In keeping with that push for real value, more than half of organisations focused their project on improving key business processes – rather than looking to improve most – or no – processes.

“This reflects a strategic, incremental approach to ERP-driven change. Organisations seem to be cherry-picking high-impact processes that yield quicker ROI while building organisational momentum for broader improvements down the road.”

The increasing availability of pre-configured industry templates and a push by vendors for selective process optimisation may also be influencing companies, Panorama says.

The 2025 ERP Report shows the continuing pivot to cloud-first models, which can make it easier to adopt emerging technologies such as AI, machine learning and advanced analytics.

There was also a strong preference for SaaS models (72 percent), over hosted or managed services (28 percent) – something the report notes aligns with the drastically reducing time frames for deployment, which was down from 15.5 months last year to nine months this year.

“Additionally, the preference for SaaS may reflect a more profound cultural shift: Businesses increasingly value tools that align with a distributed workforce and dynamic operational environments.

“This evolution suggests that the future of ERP is not just about cloud computing; it’s about leveraging SaaS ecosystems to drive continuous innovation.”

In good news, companies were reporting success realising expected benefits, with 82 percent reporting increased productivity and efficiency. The report attributes that high success in productivity and efficiency gains to the adoption of SaaS models, faster implementations and modern systems designed around industry best practices.

Reduced operating and/or labour costs (70 percent) were also noted while 65 percent cited improved customer experience. Real-time data, inventory levels, removing silos, standardisation, interactions with suppliers, compliance, IT maintenance costs and new operating models were among the other benefits achieved.

But the report also highlights ongoing issues with overruns. While more than half of those surveyed remained within their expected budget (the median project cost was US$450,000, eight percent experienced significant cost overruns and 24 percent completed their project with ‘slight more’ cost than expected – often thanks to the unexpected need for additional technology.