Box CEO predicts AI agents will enhance SaaS in hybrid future

Box CEO Aaron Levie believes AI agents won’t replace enterprise SaaS companies but will instead create a hybrid model where agents operate alongside traditional software systems. Speaking at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025, Levie outlined how this shift will fundamentally reshape enterprise software business models and create new opportunities for startups building agent-first solutions.

The big picture: Levie envisions a future where SaaS handles core business workflows while AI agents layer on top to accelerate processes and automate decisions.

• “Generally, once you have a business process, you want to be able to define that in, effectively, business logic with deterministic systems — just because the risk of that changing any given day is very high,” Levie explained.
• This “church and state” separation addresses security concerns, as agents have already caused data leaks and unexpected system damage in production environments.

Why this matters: The agent-SaaS hybrid model will dramatically transform how enterprise software companies generate revenue and scale their operations.

• Companies will need to abandon traditional per-seat pricing models as AI agents vastly outnumber human users.
• “The thing that I’m very convinced of is we’ll have about 100 times more, maybe 1,000 times more, agents than we have people,” Levie said.
• This shift requires moving to consumption and volume-based pricing models designed for AI agent usage patterns.

Startup opportunity: The platform shift creates a rare opening for new companies to emerge and challenge established players.

• Startups have an advantage because they can design agent-first processes from scratch, while larger companies must retrofit existing workflows.
• “We are in this window right now that we have not been in for about fifteen years, which is — there’s a complete platform shift happening in tech that’s opening up a spot for a new set of companies to emerge,” Levie said.
• He encouraged entrepreneurs to “fully exploit” this opportunity by building solutions that make change management easier for enterprises.

What agents will do: Rather than replacing human workers, AI agents will enhance existing business processes by providing decision support and workflow automation that accelerates whatever tasks people are trying to accomplish within SaaS systems.