Zendesk has introduced Specialised AI Agents designed for industry and business-specific tasks. The technology integrates industry knowledge with an organisation’s existing systems, workflows, and data, aiming to automate up to 80% of workflows.
The launch features two primary offerings: Industry Agents, pre-configured for common sector-specific tasks, and Custom Agents, which organisations build around internal processes and policies. These tools are designed to manage end-to-end, complex tasks and mark a progression towards Zendesk’s “Autonomous Service Workforce” framework introduced at Relate 2026.
“The era of generic, one-size-fits-all AI agents is over. The best agents are specialists: deeply grounded in the work, the industry, and the business they serve,” said Shashi Upadhyay, President of Product, Engineering and AI at Zendesk. “Specialised Agents give organisations the expertise and context to take on more complex work, earn trust, and drive quantitative impact.”
Industry Agents The initial release of Industry Agents targets the retail and e-commerce sector, supporting tasks such as product assistance, order management, returns, exchanges, delivery issues, and refunds. Zendesk plans to expand these pre-built agents to financial services, media, and technology sectors.
According to Zendesk, Industry Agents link directly into platforms like Shopify, Narvar, Stripe, and Riskified to execute actions across multiple systems without manual transfer between applications. A partnership with Riskified integrates risk intelligence data to identify fraudulent activity during returns and refund processing.
“Zendesk Industry Agents are the AI-first platform redefining retail service at scale,” said Jeff Otto, Chief Marketing Officer at Riskified. “We’re excited to embed our specialist AI agents and Identity Risk Intelligence so that every agent, AI or human, confidently knows who they’re actually engaging with, creating delightful experiences for good customers while protecting retailers from fraud and abuse losses.”
Regarding the local market, Kellie Hackney, Vice President at Zendesk Australia and New Zealand, noted: “For Australian businesses, cost of living pressures and changing consumer behaviour are raising the stakes of every customer interaction. In fact, 90% of Australian CX leaders say customers will drop brands that cannot resolve issues on first contact. The introduction of Industry Agents for commerce helps meet that expectation by combining industry expertise, customer context, and connected workflows to resolve common service moments quickly and personally – protecting loyalty while delivering better service at scale.”
Custom Agents For organisation-specific processes, businesses can design tailored agents using Agent Builder, Zendesk’s no-code development environment. Users set parameters for agent responsibilities, accessible systems, allowed actions, and required human sign-offs. Agents can run on schedules or trigger proactively based on system events.
Zendesk reports that customers performed over one million Custom Agent executions within seven weeks of launch, with some organisations seeing automated resolution rates increase by 10 percentage points following deployment.
“We want to resolve issues from beginning to end so consumers can get back to using their machines every day,” said Leora Machlis, Director of Global Customer Care at SodaStream. “Customising our integrations helps us act quickly as customer needs change.”
“When a Toniebox isn’t working, it’s not just a technical issue—it’s a toddler waiting,” added Lauren Cooper, Director of Global Customer Happiness at Tonies. “Parents want answers now, not another hold or a long conversation.”