Universidad Tecnológica de El Salvador
AI Agents
Article

AI Agents

What They Are and Their Business Impact

The Boston Consulting Group
Boston Consulting Group, 2025
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7

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AI agents — intelligent systems that can observe, plan, and act with autonomy — are redefining how businesses work. This practical and forward-thinking guide from The Boston Consulting Group breaks down what AI agents are, how they operate within real-world workflows, and where they’re already delivering measurable impact. Designed for business leaders, strategists, and technology teams alike, it offers clear insights into using these tools to streamline operations, enhance collaboration, and drive scalable innovation.

Summary

AI agents observe their environment, leverage large language models for planning, and access connected systems to accomplish goals.

AI agents operate through a self-reinforcing loop of observation, planning, and action. They gather data from their environments, such as user interactions or sensor feeds, retain memory across tasks, and plan with large or small language models. These plans drive the agents to take actions using APIs and enterprise systems.

A global consumer goods firm used an AI agent to streamline its weekly marketing performance analysis. What once required six analysts now takes one employee and an agent less than an hour. The agent autonomously collects data, analyzes results, recommends optimizations, and, with human approval...

About the Author

The Boston Consulting Group is a global management consulting firm with offices in 50 countries throughout the world. 

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