Imagine Orlando 2025: Key Moments & Insights from Quantious
Imagine 2025, hosted by Automation Anywhere in Orlando, FL delivered a dynamic and thought-provoking experience for enterprise leaders, automation professionals, and AI enthusiasts. This flagship event combined fireside chats, breakout sessions, and compelling keynotes that gave attendees a front-row seat to the future of intelligent automation.
The central theme of this year’s event was clear: we are entering the era of Agentic AI. This isn’t just the next iteration of automation—Agentic AI is redefining how organizations operate, make decisions, and scale.
Check out the Quantious team’s key takeaways and standout moments from the event.
Why Agentic AI matters
Agentic AI represents a shift from traditional, rule-based automation to systems that operate with autonomy. These agents don’t wait for commands—they pursue goals, adapt to new information, and make context-aware decisions. This opens the door to automating not just repetitive tasks but entire workflows that previously required human oversight and involvement.
The benefit? Time saved, simplified and streamlined operations, as well as more capacity for innovation at scale.
Prompt engineering is the new core skill
In this new landscape, prompt engineering is emerging as a foundational skill. Several speakers emphasized that the way we design prompts (structured instructions to guide AI behavior), can dramatically shape the quality and usefulness of AI outputs. In many ways, prompts are becoming the new code, allowing non-technical users to “program” AI in ways that deliver real business value.
From generating sales enablement content to simulating specific roles like a UX researcher or product marketer, well-structured prompts are enabling teams to interact with AI tools more strategically.
Automation starts with infrastructure, not tools
One of the most repeated insights throughout the event was that AI adoption should be infrastructure-first, not tool-first. Companies often rush to deploy new technologies without fully evaluating their readiness or their technical or cultural fit. Before launching agentic systems, organizations should assess their security protocols, governance models, integration capabilities, and employee enablement strategies in order to make a well-informed decision.
There is a shift toward measuring Return on AI (ROAI), which determines how effective AI is by measuring how frequently and deeply it’s used across an organization. It’s no longer just about traditional ROI; it’s about scalable, real-world adoption that drives meaningful business outcomes.
Culture is the true accelerator
While technology moves fast, cultural transformation is slower, though it is just as important. Speakers at Imagine 2025 emphasized the importance of fostering a team culture of curiosity around AI. Organizations making the biggest strides are those where experimentation is encouraged, learning is shared openly, and early wins are celebrated.
During the event, several companies shared how they’re appointing internal AI champions, creating sandbox environments for experimentation, and documenting successful prompt frameworks as internal playbooks. These practices are not just supporting adoption, they’re helping reshape what's possible with automation.
Agentic process automation: The evolution of RPA
Robotic Process Automation (RPA) is becoming the foundation rather than the endpoint. It’s no longer about automating a task, it’s about redefining how work is done. The next evolution, Agentic Process Automation (APA), goes beyond scripted tasks and enters the realm of AI-powered orchestration.
APA integrates bots, data, machine learning, and human feedback in a continuous loop of decision-making and execution. This allows companies to automate end-to-end business processes that once required multiple departments and manual touchpoints.
Real use cases, real transformation
From logistics to customer support, marketing operations, and more, companies are applying agentic frameworks to real-world challenges. One compelling case study came from Walmart, which shared how it's using AI to transform everything from inventory tracking to social graphing of physical store behavior. Rather than layering AI on top of existing systems, they’re reimagining business processes with AI at the core.
The takeaway? Innovation should be led by pain points, not by hype. The most successful companies are identifying specific use cases, piloting AI solutions in low-risk environments, and scaling based on results (not assumptions).
When not to use AI
A welcome and recurring reminder throughout the conference: discernment is key when it comes to AI. Just because AI can be applied doesn’t mean it should be. Ethical boundaries, emotionally complex situations, and areas requiring human judgment still demand human leadership and interaction.
Successful organizations are setting clear criteria for when and where AI should be used—and just as importantly, when it shouldn’t.
Governance and scalability
As companies scale their AI use, governance becomes non-negotiable. Policies around data access, model transparency, prompt libraries, and version control are critical to avoid risk while ensuring sustainable growth.
Several sessions touched on the importance of being proactive and building governance frameworks early rather than reacting after a major incident. This includes assigning clear responsibilities across IT, security, and business units to ensure alignment.
Looking ahead
Imagine 2025 confirmed what many already suspected: AI isn’t coming, it’s here. And the companies that are thriving are those treating it as a strategic capability, not just a tactical tool.
By 2027, Gartner predicts that 80% of automation platforms will include AI-assisted development. By 2029, most enterprises will have integrated agentic AI into their operating systems. The time to prepare isn’t later, it’s now.