AI convergence
AI is causing previously distinct sectors such as ITSM and cybersecurity to converge, with AI itself turning into a unifying AIOps front end to diverse, specialized technologies sitting below it. In this, ServiceNow looks well-placed, having added the Virtual Agent chatbot system to its Now platform as long ago as 2018, later reinforced by acquisitions, including search outfit Element AI, chatbot company Passage AI, and AIOps pioneer Loom Systems. In 2025, this evolution crystalized as the ServiceNow AI Platform, a rebranded Now platform augmented by unifying features such as the AI Control Tower.
In traditional ITSM, the platform helps teams build workflows without the need for coding in a way that simplifies complex processes. AI takes this a step further; now it becomes possible not only to generate a workflow but reason and act on it. In this, AI and ITSM look like a natural combination as each enhances the usefulness of the other.
But building a better AI front end or adding automation to workflows gets you only so far, which makes the company’s Armis acquisition, its largest ever, intriguing. Unlike previous ServiceNow acquisitions with a cybersecurity theme — Veza in 2025, Mission Secure in 2024 — Armis’s agentless platform is more than an information gathering system. It can also orchestrate actions such as isolation and blocking across a wide range of devices, including workstations, routers, switches, firewalls, and the long tail of often forgotten medical scanners and IoT devices.
