The Extinction Event Enterprise Software Didn’t See Coming

January 12, 2026 was an extinction-level event for Enterprise Software. Software is being disintermediated by the very AI tools it helped create.

The launch of Claude Cowork, built 80%+ (some say 100%, but that’s eyewash) using Anthropic’s Claude Code in a 10-day sprint, didn’t just shock the market, it confirmed what investors had begun pricing in. (My own legacy software stock portfolio is down ~30% in just two trading cycles since.)

When AI agents can build software autonomously, run workflows, and execute processes end-to-end, the VALUE EQUATION FLIPS IMMEDIATELY. If the marginal corporate dollar flows directly to AI instead of software licenses or labor, capital markets follow the same logic.

That’s why we’re seeing the unprecedented inversion: Investors are paying premium multiples for chips, traditionally considered asset-heavy, cyclical, supply-chain-exposed businesses, OVER software once prized for sticky, high-margin recurring revenue. That’s NOT noise, it’s a signal of the end to come for legacy software and software development service providers will see a significant runoff too. This 10-day sprint also signals roughly 70–90% REDUCTION in traditional human coding man-hours. If that’s not a Tsunami of revenue depletion for global software providers and Indian legacy providers, then nothing is.

In an Agentic AI world, enterprise software moats are thinner, UI/UX is redundant, switching costs weaker, and differentiation harder to defend. The winners won’t be the loudest SaaS brands of the past. They’ll be the ones embedded in AI-native workflows, outcomes, and economics. Remaining outfits? Well, they won’t remain as they’re about to learn what “recurring” really means when the stack gets rewritten.

“Behind your tunnel vision, reality fades like shadows into the night.” Ring a (division) bell?

Blind RFPs for Every Client Problem

Blind RFPs were built for a different era when IT, BPO, and captive models were new, terminology was fuzzy, and target baselines didn’t exist.

For mature sourcing decisions, forcing every need through a blind RFP produces predictable tripe:
✔ Comparable responses
✖ Differentiated thinking
✖ Context-aware solutions

True sourcing maturity is knowing WHEN NOT TO to default to traditional RFP motions.

Modern Managed Services PlayBook for Maximizing CX Impact & Digital Asset RoI

Most of HEX’s 2025 Managed Services engagements focused on Asset Monetization, from incumbency re-solutioning / re-platforming to contract recasting spanning hardware, software, services, and data assets and AIOps.

If your assets aren’t paying their way, it’s time to RETHINK how you manage them.

For more playbooks and perspectives, see:
https://hexadvisory.com/blog/category/perspectives

1 Missing Discipline. 6 Inevitable Failures.

GCC is not a standalone utopia.
It’s the coming together of people, process, and governance — tethered in a clear operating model. And without change management, even the best-architected GCC will crumble from within.

Here’s what we see in failed setups:
→ Competitors gain ground while you’re stuck in internal debates
→ Talent resists, then exits
→ Operations stutter and CXOs scramble
→ Stakeholders lose faith — and funding follows
→ Institutional knowledge evaporates
→ Brand takes hits that PR can’t fix

Reality vs. Rhetoric gap is HUGE in this space.

If you think trends, webinars, and research reports will prepare your enterprise for GCC transformation — you’re wrong. Change management is the new cost of entry.

HEX Advisory Group specializes in hands-on GCC execution with referenceable CXO clients, senior sourcing practitioners like Alison Armstrong, MSM MIS who helped us put together this POV from her experience from her client engagements over the years.

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