Indian manufacturers are racing to deploy AI agents — EY finds 24% already live in production

Direct answer: Indian manufacturers are adopting AI agents faster than most of the world — EY's 2026 "AIdea of India" research finds 24% of Indian organizations already have agentic AI actively deployed, with manufacturing use cases concentrated in predictive maintenance and computer-vision quality control, and India's overall at-scale AI usage outpacing the global average.

What happened

EY India's Agentic AI research, part of its broader "AIdea of India: Outlook 2026" series, tracks how fast Indian enterprises — manufacturing among the most active — are moving from AI pilots to production-deployed agents that plan and execute multi-step tasks with limited human oversight.

Key facts and numbers

• 24% of Indian organizations report agentic AI actively deployed today, according to EY's research.
• 40% of Indian respondents report significant or full AI usage at scale — well above the roughly 28% global average reported in the same research.
• At-scale deployment is strongest in product development (62%), strategy and operations (56%), marketing and sales (55%), and supply chain (48%).
• 91% of Indian leaders cite deployment speed as the deciding factor in buy-versus-build decisions — a strong tilt toward fast-to-deploy platforms over custom-built systems.

Where manufacturers specifically are focused

In manufacturing specifically, predictive maintenance and computer-vision quality control account for the largest share of active AI deployments — driven by aging industrial equipment and the high cost of unplanned production stoppages. The automotive sector is leading this shift, using AI agents to streamline assembly-line throughput and reduce rework, with pharmaceutical manufacturers close behind, applying AI to drug discovery support and production-line efficiency.

Why it matters

This isn't experimentation-stage adoption — nearly a quarter of Indian organizations already have agents live in production, and manufacturing specifically is prioritizing use cases with a direct, measurable line to cost: unplanned downtime and defect rates are two of the most expensive line items a plant manager can move.

Industry impact

India's manufacturing base — long defined by cost-competitive labor — is now competing on a second axis: how fast a plant can deploy AI-driven quality and maintenance systems. That shift changes what "competitive" manufacturing capacity looks like in India going forward, and raises the bar for manufacturers still running fully manual quality control and reactive maintenance.

Risks

EY's broader research also flags a common pattern across fast-adopting markets: deployment speed is outpacing governance in some organizations, with data quality and integration — not the underlying AI models — the most common reason production deployments underperform.

What businesses should do next

Manufacturers evaluating AI agents should start with the two proven, highest-ROI categories — predictive maintenance and computer-vision quality control — rather than broad, unscoped AI initiatives, since these are the use cases with the clearest evidence of production-ready results in the Indian market specifically.

What happens next

Expect adoption to keep climbing across mid-size manufacturers, not just large enterprises, as deployment-speed-focused, pre-built agent platforms lower the barrier that previously required a dedicated data science team.

Frequently asked questions

What percentage of Indian manufacturers use AI agents? EY's 2026 research finds 24% of Indian organizations have agentic AI actively deployed in production, with manufacturing among the more active sectors.

What are AI agents used for in manufacturing specifically? Predictive maintenance (flagging equipment issues before failure) and computer-vision quality control (automatically detecting defects) are the two largest categories of active manufacturing AI deployment in India.

Which manufacturing sub-sectors are leading adoption? Automotive manufacturing leads, using AI to streamline assembly-line throughput and reduce rework, with pharmaceutical manufacturing close behind on drug discovery and production efficiency.

How does India's AI adoption compare globally? 40% of Indian respondents report significant or full AI usage at scale, compared to roughly 28% globally, according to EY's research.

What's the biggest risk in this fast adoption? Deployment speed is outpacing governance in some organizations — data quality and integration issues, not model capability, are the most common cause of underperforming deployments.

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Cor Advance Solutions builds AI agent and automation systems for manufacturers — see our predictive maintenance AI guide for manufacturing or explore our AI & Machine Learning services.

Source: EY India — Agentic AI in India: The AIdea of India 2026 Report