Why This Matters to Distributors: Enterprise resource planning providers are moving artificial intelligence from analytics and recommendations into direct operational execution, potentially reshaping how distributors manage freight, inventory, order processing, and supply chain workflows.
Epicor is expanding its push into agentic artificial intelligence with a new software framework designed to allow artificial intelligence agents to execute tasks directly inside enterprise resource planning systems used by distributors, manufacturers, and supply chain operators.
The Austin, Texas-based software company introduced several new capabilities within its Epicor Prism platform during the company’s Epicor Insights 2026 conference, including a new artificial intelligence design framework called Epicor Lux, a self-service development environment known as Prism Agent Foundry and additional artificial intelligence agents aimed at automating operational workflows.
The announcement reflects growing competition among enterprise resource planning providers to embed agentic artificial intelligence directly into core business systems as distributors and manufacturers seek ways to automate increasingly complex operational processes.
Unlike earlier generations of artificial intelligence tools focused primarily on analytics, search and content generation, Epicor said its latest Prism agents are designed to take direct action within enterprise resource planning workflows. New agents introduced by the company include tools for freight auditing, shipment tracking, material requirements planning analysis, electronic data interchange troubleshooting, and business rules creation.
Among the new offerings is a freight spend agent that analyzes shipping and enterprise resource planning data to identify carrier discrepancies and freight leakage. Another, called the material requirements planning log agent, analyzes material requirements, planning recommendations to explain why purchasing or inventory decisions were generated.
Epicor also introduced a reasoning agent designed to synthesize enterprise resource planning data and documents into operational recommendations, along with a Prophet 21 business rules agent that allows distributors to create or modify enterprise resource planning business rules using natural language prompts. Prophet 21 is Epicor’s distribution-focused enterprise resource planning platform widely used by wholesale distributors.
The company said more than 30 additional artificial intelligence agents are in development across logistics, invoicing, compliance, sustainability, and financial planning workflows.
Epicor executives said the expansion builds on existing artificial intelligence deployments already operating in production environments across its customer base. The company said its Prism Knowledge Agent currently processes more than 70,000 requests per month across its Kinetic, Prophet 21 and Propello applications.
Epicor also said its systems support inventory and transaction activity across 40% of the estimated $54 billion U.S. independent wholesale automotive aftermarket for light- and medium-duty parts distributors. The company said the scale of that dataset helps provide operational context for artificial intelligence-driven recommendations and workflow execution.
In addition to new workflow agents, Epicor outlined a longer-term strategy focused on what it described as “headless enterprise resource planning,” an architecture designed to allow artificial intelligence agents and external large language model platforms to interact directly with enterprise systems through application programming interfaces and interoperability standards such as Model Context Protocol.
The strategy reflects a broader shift across enterprise software markets as vendors attempt to reposition enterprise resource planning systems from systems of record into systems capable of autonomous operational execution.
Epicor said its Prism platform includes governance controls intended to keep humans involved in operational decisions while allowing artificial intelligence agents to automate portions of supply chain and distribution workflows.
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