Expert Voices Ahead of DMEXCO 26: OMMAX on why agentic AI actually matters

Part 1 of our partner series ahead of DMEXCO 2026.

This September, Ibexa is heading to DMEXCO in Cologne, and we're bringing our partner network with us. This year, we're especially looking forward to the conversations around agentic marketing: how AI agents are starting to take on real work inside the marketing stack, and what that means for the teams running it.

To get a feel for how that shift looks from the front line, we asked our partners for their take. From building the foundation to thinking about the future of agentic marketing, this interview series takes us every step of the way. 

To open the series, we spoke to Sven Voertmann of OMMAX, Ibexa's Platinum Partner and two-time Partner of the Year for Northern and Central Europe. Here's what he told us.

Where do you see the biggest opportunity for AI and Agentic in today's organisations?

"The greatest potential emerges, in our experience, wherever AI solves a real problem or opens up entirely new possibilities, for example new, innovative products or services.

One example from practice: at a large education platform, we implemented lead management using AI agents. The agent enriches contact data, personalises outreach, optimises channel selection and activates leads. In 100 days, this created more than 1.3 million personalised interactions, and conversion rose by 20 percent. That's real value for everyone involved, and it wouldn't have been possible without AI."

Which expectations around AI do you think are realistic, and which are not?

"What's realistic are clear improvements on tasks that are repetitive, involve processing large amounts of information, and can be well defined. Research, drafting, classification, personalisation, quality assurance and steering already work well today.

What's unrealistic is the hope that an agent can simply work around bad data, unclear processes and missing ownership. That's a costly misconception. Honestly, in our projects we run into organisational limits far more often than technological ones."

What steps should organisations take today if they want to prepare for Agentic?

"We always advise our customers: don't start with the question "which agent should we build?" Instead, pick a process that's painful today. Where are teams losing a lot of time? Where do unnecessary handoffs happen? Where do customers wait too long? And what would change economically if that process worked better?

After that, you need a responsible business owner and a deliberate decision about what the AI is allowed to take on, and where a human still checks, the well-known "human-in-the-loop" model. The first use case can be small, but it should be designed from the outset so it doesn't fail later at scale because of data access, governance or lack of adoption. Our guiding principle for getting started with agentic is fairly simple: start small, but don't think small."

What defines a modern Digital Experience Platform in your view?

"A modern DXP above all needs strong orchestration capabilities, and needs to be flexible and modular. A DXP connects content, product information, customer data, commerce and activation in a way that lets the customer experience a consistent brand. And all of that needs to be intuitive for the internal team to manage, first and foremost the marketing team. So the user experience of the DXP itself plays an important role too.

In our view, Ibexa fits perfectly into this moment. DXP, PIM, CDP and engagement aren't treated as loose tools, but as a connected, controllable system. Companies can evolve their existing landscape while, step by step, building more orchestration, and that in turn is a basic prerequisite for AI.

At an international B2B provider, for example, we used Ibexa to consolidate four brands and several grown systems onto a shared platform. That reduced technical complexity, and at the same time created a common foundation to develop content, lead flows and digital services more consistently going forward."

In your opinion, what makes a successful partnership between a software vendor and an implementation partner?

"The standard has to be that the customer barely notices the interface between software vendor and implementation partner in everyday work. Above all, they shouldn't have to coordinate themselves who's responsible for which part.

Ibexa brings the product vision, the platform and deep platform-specific knowledge. OMMAX combines that with business strategy, customer experience, data, AI, architecture and years of implementation experience. We've known each other on both sides for years, we trust each other, and we speak a common language. That's the foundation for delivering excellent customer projects together."

Which values define the way you work?

"If we had to narrow it down to our top three, they'd probably be: curiosity, responsibility and impact.

Curiosity, for us, means really understanding a customer and staying close to the pulse of technology and the times: where is value created? Why does a process work the way it does today? What are the conditions for success? Only after that do we talk about the technical solution.

Responsibility means we don't hand over a recommendation and then pass the baton. We accompany the whole journey, from the idea through the business case and architecture to a solution that actually works in daily use, on most of our projects. That way the customer has one point of contact and avoids unnecessary handoffs and friction.

From more than 4,000 projects, we know that a strategy needs to be technically viable and needs to be adopted by the organisation. A clean implementation, in turn, only counts if it solves a relevant business problem. And that's where impact comes in: whether customers and employees feel a concrete improvement, and whether it's measurable in return on investment."
 

Thank you to Sven and the OMMAX team for opening the series. 

With the business case made, the next question is technical: what foundation actually needs to be in place before agents can do any of this? That's next, in Part 2 with webit!.