Why cloud adoption stalls
Our research with Amazon Web Services® (AWS®) and Radar— The sleepwalker paradox: Are you modernizing or just maintaining?—shows how organizations that adopt the cloud out of competitive anxiety, rather than strategic intent, can end up looking modern on the outside while carrying the same fragmented processes underneath. Real value requires clear outcomes defined upfront, connected governance, and people equipped to use what they've been given. This isn't an abstract risk. It plays out differently, but just as visibly, across every market.Three markets, one AI gap
Across the Nordics, Benelux, and the United Kingdom (UK) and Ireland, the pressure driving AI adoption looks different from market to market, but the pattern underneath is the same. Nordic organizations, often early cloud adopters, are now unwinding years of migrations that never delivered the promised agility—the "sleepwalking" legacy this report describes. In Benelux, margin pressure in manufacturing and food and beverage is turning AI from a nice-to-have into a business case built on yield, sustainability, and traceability. In the UK and Ireland, regulatory scrutiny means governance has to be foundational, not bolted on. What ties these markets together is clear: Legacy systems are running out of room to support agentic AI. The organizations moving fastest are the ones whose architecture can actually support autonomous action, not just dashboards. That architecture is where the real gap lies.The architecture that makes AI possible
Headless enterprise resource planning (ERP) is the architectural shift that changes the equation. By separating the user interface from the ERP core, it creates an application programming interface (API)-first backbone—one that any user interface, application, or AI agent can connect to and draw on. The core stays stable, innovation happens around it, and agents get clean, consistent data to act on. Infor™ has built on this foundation for over five years, backed by more than 8,500 APIs. With that foundation in place, the question shifts from “Can we support AI?” to “What should AI actually do?”From recording to acting
Gartner® calls the destination enterprise resource execution (ERX). Traditional ERP tells you what happened. ERX acts on what's happening: catching a supply shortage before it hits the line, finding an alternative supplier, keeping production moving. Zahid Group is already there—deploying agents across invoice-to-cash processes that surface overdue accounts, flag credit risk, and generate dunning letters automatically. Most organizations are still in the early stages of this journey. The gap between where they are and intelligent ERX is where competitive differences are being decided right now. Closing that gap isn't a single leap. It takes four capabilities working together.Getting to the agentic enterprise
As outlined in our blog, The agentic enterprise, getting to ERX takes four capabilities working in concert: industry knowledge encoded from day one; agents that people can actually work with; action across full processes instead of on isolated tasks; and trust built into the core, rather than added on.
These capabilities are already delivering results for our customers. Meyn scaled accounts payable (AP) processing with agents that understood its specific operational context. Amalthea improved cheese yield and sustainability together. Zeelandia enhanced customer experiences across a complex, multi-market operation. Combilift boosted equipment uptime and client satisfaction by acting across service, inventory, and customer data. Four capabilities, one platform, delivered together.
What Infor offers
Infor's answer is Infor Velocity Suite, built on the headless, multi-tenant architecture described above. It embeds industry logic in the core, integrates through open APIs, and builds in governance rather than bolting it on. Industry depth, human-agent collaboration, end-to-end reach, and trust aren't separate initiatives here; they're one architecture delivering all four at once. What that means in practice comes down to daily life.
Old ERP, new ERP, or something in between
The choice isn't just cloud versus on-premises anymore—it's what kind of cloud architecture. Classic on-premises ERP means front-loaded infrastructure costs, custom integrations to maintain, and upgrades on the vendor's schedule, with every new AI capability arriving as its own project. Single-tenant cloud ERP removes the hardware burden but often just relocates the same rigid, customized core—still on a slower upgrade path and more difficult to connect to agents. Multi-tenant, headless ERP is a different model altogether: a shared, continuously updated core with openness built into the architecture, where security, scaling, and patching are handled centrally. That's the difference between an estate that merely looks modernized and one actually built to support AI agents at scale.
The organizations pulling ahead aren't the ones who move the fastest. They're the ones who move with a clear sense of direction.
Hakan Strombeck
Industry & Solution Strategy Director, Infor
Håkan Strömbeck, Director of Industry & Solution Strategy, specializes in the Distribution industry at Infor. With a diverse background spanning various software companies, from startups to global solution providers, Håkan brings a wealth of experience to his role.
Beyond the realm of software, Håkan has immersed himself in operational roles across different companies and served as a management consultant for global firms. Throughout his career, he has consistently emphasized the dynamic interplay between people, processes, and systems.
In his current role, Håkan is shaping and guiding the strategic direction for Infor’s capabilities in the distribution industry. To be curious and humbly challenge current structures and way of working Håkan want to help Infor’s customer be prepared for the future and embrace innovations.
Håkan is an appreciated speaker and enjoys to be involved with Infor’s customers.
Originally Håkan studied finance, where he received an MBA, but has spent most of his career in the area of systems and solutions.