- The analyst consensus for 2026 is loud and unanimous: industrial AI is everywhere, agentic systems are scaling, autonomous production is the defining trend of the decade. McKinsey reports 72% daily AI use across enterprises – and only 18% measurable productivity gains. Gartner expects 40% of agentic AI projects to be cancelled by 2027. This keynote takes the audience above the noise: it asks which of the prevailing narratives about smart machinery and smart process industry actually hold up against the data, which collapse under scrutiny, and what that means for how European industrial leaders should read the next three years – not as a hype cycle, but as a strategic inflection point.