The company launches a multi-pronged AI strategy aimed at SMBs and enterprise clients

Zoho Corporation has announced a major expansion of its artificial intelligence (AI) offerings with the launch of new tools and capabilities designed to deepen AI integration across its suite of business applications. The latest rollout includes three proprietary large language models (LLMs), 25 prebuilt AI agents, a custom agent builder, an AI marketplace, and a new privacy-centric multi-modal compute platform (MCP).

The move reflects Zoho’s commitment to building an in-house AI ecosystem that prioritizes contextual intelligence, user customization, and data privacy. The company's Zia AI platform—already embedded into more than 45 Zoho applications—will now be further enhanced with conversational, generative, and analytical capabilities powered by its own LLMs.

Zia LLM and Custom AI Agents

At the heart of Zoho’s update is the launch of Zia LLM, a family of in-house large language models trained specifically for business use cases such as customer service, sales enablement, finance, and IT support. These models are engineered to operate within the context of Zoho's tightly integrated application ecosystem, allowing users to automate and personalize a wide range of workflows.

To facilitate adoption, Zoho has introduced 25 prebuilt AI agents, each designed to perform specific tasks like generating emails, analyzing customer queries, or summarizing long documents. In addition, the Zia Custom Agent Builder allows businesses to create and train their own AI agents using internal data, workflows, and rules—without requiring any prior coding knowledge.

This no-code environment enables SMEs and larger enterprises alike to experiment with AI-driven automations, while tailoring their solutions to industry-specific needs.

Introducing the Zia AI Agent Marketplace

Another highlight of Zoho’s launch is the unveiling of the Zia Agent Marketplace, a curated hub for AI agents where users can browse, deploy, or customize agents based on their operational requirements. The marketplace serves as both a distribution platform and a collaboration space, allowing developers and vendors to list their custom agents and make them available to the broader Zoho user base.

This marketplace is expected to drive AI adoption among Zoho’s 100 million+ global users by reducing the time and technical barriers to implementation.

MCP: A Privacy-First Compute Platform

In line with growing concerns around AI-related data privacy and compliance, Zoho has also rolled out a new multi-modal compute platform (MCP). This platform provides a secure environment for running AI workloads, supporting hybrid deployments that allow customers to process sensitive data locally or in the cloud—according to their privacy policies and regional regulations.

The MCP is designed to seamlessly support both Zoho’s native AI services and third-party models like OpenAI, Anthropic, or Cohere, providing flexibility while maintaining data ownership and compliance standards.

According to Zoho CEO Sridhar Vembu, the MCP ensures that AI development does not come at the cost of user trust: “Privacy is not a feature—it is a commitment. Our AI is designed to empower businesses without compromising their data sovereignty.”

Integration Across Zoho's Ecosystem

Zoho’s new AI capabilities are already being embedded across applications such as Zoho CRM, Zoho Desk, Zoho Books, and Zoho Projects, enabling users to access insights, automate repetitive tasks, and interact with AI agents via chat, voice, or written prompts.

For instance, customer service teams can now deploy Zia agents that handle tickets, summarize conversations, or recommend next actions. In sales, AI-generated forecasts and communication assistance tools are being integrated directly into pipelines.

Industry Context

This AI expansion positions Zoho more competitively against players like Salesforce, Microsoft, and Freshworks, who have also integrated generative AI into their platforms. However, Zoho's end-to-end approach—spanning LLM development, agent deployment, marketplace distribution, and a privacy-first infrastructure—distinguishes it as one of the few companies to maintain full-stack AI control.

Analysts view this as a strategic move to empower Zoho’s core base of SMBs with accessible yet powerful AI, while appealing to enterprise clients looking for secure and scalable AI solutions.