In this special report, Bob Evans sits down with Steve Miranda, Executive Vice President of Applications Development at Oracle, from Oracle Park in San Francisco to discuss one of the biggest shifts happening in enterprise technology: agentic AI applications. Miranda explains how Oracle is moving beyond embedded AI and AI agents to fully agentic applications that can act on business objectives rather than just automate transactions. From finance and supply chain to HR and customer service, he shares how this transformation is changing operations, competitiveness, employee roles, and the very mindset organizations need to succeed in the AI Era.
Rise of Agentic Apps
The Big Themes:
- From AI Features to Agentic Applications: Steve Miranda explains that Oracle’s AI journey has evolved in three major stages. First, Oracle embedded AI directly into applications to help generate and enhance content, improving the traditional user experience. Next came AI agents — workflow-driven systems capable of handling transaction sequences across ERP, HCM, supply chain, and CX. Now Oracle is introducing agentic applications, which represent a full redesign of enterprise software. These systems allow users to set business objectives rather than manually manage transactions. Instead of handling purchase orders, invoices, or approvals individually, users provide strategic guidance while AI agents execute, monitor, and optimize outcomes.
- Competitive Advantage Comes from Speed: Miranda stresses that agentic AI is not only about reducing costs through automation — it is about increasing business speed and adaptability. In competitive markets, companies need to react instantly to supply chain disruptions, shifting cash positions, pricing opportunities, and customer demands. Human-driven workflows create delays, while agentic applications can monitor both internal operations and external market conditions in real time. AI can identify early payment discounts, detect supply chain disruptions, or recommend immediate operational adjustments faster than traditional teams. This responsiveness creates a major competitive edge. Companies that adopt agentic applications can operate faster and more efficiently, while those that delay risk falling behind competitors who are able to move at machine speed
- Oracle’s Pricing Philosophy Supports Adoption: Miranda explains that Oracle’s pricing philosophy for AI remains intentionally customer-friendly. Core AI improvements — including embedded AI and standard agentic capabilities — are included within existing application subscriptions. Customers subscribing to financials, HCM, supply chain, or other Fusion applications receive these enhancements as part of the normal service evolution, much like database upgrades. Additional charges apply only when customers extend applications further, such as building custom agents or adding specialized workflows through Agent Studio. Those extensions use token-based pricing, which reflects current industry standards for AI usage. This model gives customers both innovation and flexibility: they benefit from improved core functionality without surprise costs, while paying incrementally only when they choose to expand AI into additional areas of the business.
The Big Quote: “We’re essentially rebuilding our applications from the ground up to make them agentic.”
More from Steve Miranda and Oracle:
Connect with Steve on LinkedIn or learn more about Oracle AI Agent for Fusion Applications.
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