Why Your AI Agents are Only As Good as the Knowledge Behind Them

The race to deploy AI agents is accelerating, but most organizations are still building on sand. A new Gartner report suggests that the key to building reliable AI agents is a “context layer”.

According to Gartner’s latest research, 42% of enterprises plan to deploy AI agents by the end of 2026, and AI agent spending is expected to grow from 22% to 31% of total AI budgets in just one year. Despite this wave of investment, only one in five organizations report that their GenAI tools are delivering significant value. Hallucinations, limited impact, and unpredictable behavior remain stubbornly common.

The problem, Gartner argues, isn’t the models, but rather what surrounds them.