Kyndryl’s AI push spurs global cloud, mainframe overhaul

In July 2026, Kyndryl unveiled its AI Orchestration for Business platform, designed to dismantle siloed AI pilots by autonomously coordinating AI agents across diverse enterprise functions such as supply chain, commerce, finance, IT, and customer operations. This platform leverages governed, policy-driven workflows and 'policy as code' to ensure transparency and compliance, targeting sectors like retail, consumer packaged goods, travel, and transportation to enhance personalized customer experiences, real-time responsiveness, and seamless fulfillment.

Built on the cloud- and large language model-agnostic Kyndryl Agentic AI Framework, the orchestration platform integrates seamlessly with both modern and legacy enterprise systems, facilitating broad adoption across varied IT landscapes. Supported by Kyndryl Consult experts, this approach not only accelerates deployment but also supports enterprises in modernizing their infrastructure while preserving existing investments, reflecting a pragmatic hybrid cloud strategy.

Executives including Rachel Calhoun and Matteo Taglioni emphasize that Kyndryl’s AI orchestration platform is pivotal in embedding AI into daily business operations, enabling faster decision-making, reducing operational disruptions, and improving revenue protection. This shift underscores the platform’s role in transforming AI from isolated experiments into integral, governed components of enterprise workflows, thereby driving tangible business value.

Kyndryl’s decade-long partnership with Alpina Colombia culminates in a transformative migration to SAP Cloud ERP Private on AWS, integrating AI-driven platforms like Kyndryl Bridge and a dedicated data factory. This modernization not only boosts Alpina’s operational agility and resilience but also exemplifies how sustained collaboration can align IT infrastructure upgrades with evolving industry demands for efficiency and traceability.

In the financial sector, Kyndryl is advancing innovation through its expanded collaboration with Banque Internationale à Luxembourg (BIL), launching Luxembourg’s first AI virtual banking assistant, 'Berry,' and embedding agentic AI and cloud technologies across BIL’s IT infrastructure. This partnership underscores Kyndryl’s expertise in regulated environments, enhancing compliance, governance, and cyber resilience while reshaping customer experience via cutting-edge AI labs and academic collaborations.

Kyndryl’s modernization of Ethniki Asfalistiki’s mainframe environment on Kyndryl zCloud reflects a strategic pivot in insurance IT towards resilience as a core business capability. Since 2021, this collaboration has improved system scalability, reliability, and agility to serve nearly 2 million policyholders amid rising digital service demands, demonstrating how agile, customer-centric IT operations can mitigate risk and elevate performance in legacy-dependent sectors.

In the government domain, Kyndryl’s selection by the North Carolina Division of Motor Vehicles to overhaul legacy COBOL systems with cloud-based solutions on Microsoft Azure leverages its proven DMV modernization track record across multiple states. This initiative aims to accelerate digital engagement and operational efficiency through faster transactions, expanded online services, and innovative tools like mobile apps and digital wallets, significantly improving both customer and staff experiences.

By 2026, Kyndryl's partnership with Google Cloud had matured into a powerhouse collaboration, earning five Partner of the Year Awards across regions including EMEA and Latin America, underscoring their innovation in infrastructure modernization and talent development. Building on recognition as the 2025 Global Partner of the Year, Kyndryl has leveraged this relationship since 2021 to deliver cutting-edge distributed cloud and AI solutions that enable enterprises to modernize applications and transform operations across hybrid and multicloud environments.

Central to their joint innovation is the integration of Google Distributed Cloud with Kubernetes-based modernization on Google Kubernetes Engine, which empowers organizations to maintain strict data sovereignty and governance while benefiting from a unified operating model for security and lifecycle management across on-premises, private, and public clouds. This approach not only accelerates AI-driven innovation but also enhances cost efficiency and operational resilience for data-intensive workloads in distributed settings, reflecting a strategic response to enterprises’ growing demands for hybrid cloud agility and compliance.

Kyndryl and Google Cloud have also tailored industry-specific cloud solutions that drive IT modernization and sustainability, exemplified by projects like PiSA Farmacéutica’s technology upgrade in Mexico and Nike’s distributor data modernization in Argentina and Uruguay. Their AI-powered Aviation Industry Cloud Solution optimizes airline operations and customer experiences, while sustainability commitments are reinforced through the Google Cloud Ready – Energy & Carbon designation and partnerships with companies such as CMPC in Chile to align cloud modernization with carbon reduction goals.

A standout example of this collaboration’s impact is Kyndryl’s successful migration of Pidilite’s non-ERP workloads to Google Cloud, completing the company’s data center exit and enabling a fully live production environment. This modernization delivered a 20% improvement in service response and a 30% reduction in infrastructure provisioning times, with Pidilite’s CIO Vivek Sharma crediting Kyndryl’s decade-long partnership and cloud expertise as pivotal to building a scalable IT foundation for their data- and AI-led transformation. Kyndryl’s structured migration methodologies and cloud-native management practices further enhanced operational visibility and automation, enabling faster business responsiveness.

By early 2026, Kyndryl had solidified its leadership in mainframe modernization through its extensive work with Ethniki Asfalistiki, where since 2021 it enhanced the insurer’s core systems on Kyndryl zCloud, boosting flexibility, scalability, and operational resilience. This collaboration exemplifies a broader strategic shift among financial institutions that now prioritize resilience as a fundamental business capability, supported by agile, customer-centric IT operations that reduce risk and improve system performance amid rising digital demands.

Kyndryl’s recognition as a leader in the 2026 ISG Provider Lens™ Mainframes report across multiple categories underscores its comprehensive modernization approach, which integrates security, governance, automation, AIOps, and AI-enabled discovery. Central to this strategy is the proprietary Kyndryl Bridge platform, which leverages agentic AI and hybrid cloud integration to deliver responsible, scalable, and resilient mainframe transformations that align with evolving enterprise needs.

Beyond modernization, Kyndryl has emerged as a frontrunner in digital sustainability, earning leadership accolades in Europe and the US for embedding environmental, social, and governance (ESG) principles into IT solutions. Utilizing AI-powered tools like the Kyndryl Sustainability Advisor and the Kyndryl Bridge platform, the company enables clients to achieve measurable sustainability outcomes by optimizing environments and enhancing application efficiency, thereby embedding sustainability deeply into technology systems and business functions.

AI-powered tools like Kyndryl Sustainability Advisor and Bridge platform are driving measurable environmental and efficiency gains, making sustainability a built-in feature of enterprise technology.