Analysis

AI Agents, Their Hidden Memory, and the Companies Positioned to Benefit

Editorial Board · June 15, 2026

Every AI agent needs a place to store and retrieve information. As businesses move from experimenting with AI to deploying agents that perform real work, the companies providing that data infrastructure may prove just as important as the model builders. We examine five S&P 500 co

Artificial intelligence is moving beyond chatbots.

The first wave of AI largely involved asking a question and receiving an answer. The next wave centers on AI agents: software systems that take actions, use tools, retrieve information, and complete tasks with minimal supervision. An AI agent might schedule meetings, research suppliers, summarize legal documents, monitor inventory, analyze financial reports, or coordinate a marketing campaign. Rather than answering a single prompt, it works through a series of steps toward a goal.