In GenAI’s third year, software vendors are getting more nuanced with the AI wares they are bringing to market, with an emphasis on more integration. These 20 companies are at the forefront of helping solution providers prove the value of AI to customers.

Agentic artificial intelligence. Video generation. And AI focused on individual industries ranging from health care to manufacturing.

In generative AI’s third year, software vendors are getting more nuanced with the AI wares they are bringing to market, with an emphasis on more integration for improved insight and analysis and customers moving past the excitement of new technology to demand evidence of a return on their potential AI investments.

But most importantly for solution providers, vendors enter the AI era without channel attachment at their own peril, with customers needing their trusted IT advisers to explain the business case of AI and where it fits in their IT estate as continued global uncertainty means customers will pay more and more attention to the transformation projects that get budget.

[RELATED: GenAI’s Year Three: Solution Providers Zero In On ROI, Industry Use Cases]

In January, research firm Gartner named IT services the largest spending market in the tech world, with worldwide spending on IT services expected to hit $1.73 trillion this year, up from $1.59 trillion in 2024.

Software spending is expected to surpass the $1 trillion mark once again in 2025, with the market expected to jump more than 14 percent year over year, reaching $1.25 trillion this year compared with $1.09 trillion spent in 2024. Gartner called GenAI an “influence” on software’s expected double-digit growth.

As part of CRN’s second annual AI 100 list, here are the 20 software companies that are taking AI to the next level.

https://www.crn.com/news/software/2025/the-20-hottest-ai-software-companies-the-2025-crn-ai-100