Big CX News from AWS, ServiceNow, Forrester & Zoho

The nights are drawing in, the temperature is dropping, and CX analysts from across the globe are dusting off their crystal balls.

While you can expect an onslaught of predictions over the coming months, very few will have the prestige of Forrester, a leading global research and advisory firm with expertise in the CX space.

In a blog post discussing the current and future state of customer experience, Maxie Schmidt, VP and Principal Analyst at Forrester, described 2025 as “another tough year for CX teams.”

She believes that “many CX teams are drifting dangerously close to the event horizon of metric obsession” and are “circling the black hole of measurement without meaning.”

While Schmidt’s remarks sound troubling at best, and downright alarming at worst, she also offers reasons to be optimistic, stating that “2026 marks a critical inflection point.

“Some [organizations] will break free — modernizing, upskilling, and repositioning CX as a catalyst for business value. Others will cling to legacy practices and risk being pulled beyond the point of no return, where CX loses relevance and credibility.”

The predictions not only outline the challenges and roadblocks that CX teams might face in 2026, but they also offer guidance and advice on how to combat them (Read on...).

Zoho Builds CRM-Based Dealership Platform for Mercedes-Benz India

Zoho has built SKYLine, a new CRM-based dealership management platform for Mercedes-Benz India, which is designed to modernize how the automaker engages with customers.

The bespoke Dealer Management System (DMS), which was built on Zoho’s CRM and implemented by the software provider’s Enterprise Business Solutions team, has been rolled out across Mercedes-Benz dealerships across India.

SKYLine aims to deliver a more connected and transparent experience to customers across the company’s dealership network using AI-driven analytics. The system is designed to make each stage of the customer journey, from booking a service appointment to post-service feedback, faster and more personalized.

Vehicle owners get a unified portal where they can track service updates in real-time, view invoices, and access a full service history through a unified customer portal.

SKYLine replaces legacy systems with a decentralized architecture in which each dealership operates on its own Zoho CRM solution. This gives individual dealers the flexibility to tailor their workflows to their operations, while aligning with brand standards and compliance.

The system integrates with the automaker’s global HQ infrastructure through a middleware layer powered by Zoho’s workflow orchestration tool, Qntrl. This allows real-time data exchange across multiple protocols without requiring the automaker to make changes to its legacy systems.

“Together, we have built a decentralized platform that empowers each dealership with autonomy, while maintaining central control and real-time HQ integration,” said Mani Vembu, Zoho’s CEO (Read on).