Process Intelligence in India: Celonis’ AI strategy explained

Most organisations across India are speeding up their artificial intelligence journeys, but the main question remains unanswered: why do most AI initiatives fail to scale beyond pilots? According to Kaushik Mitra, Vice President and Head of India GTM at Celonis, the answer is hidden in what he calls a missing intelligence layer. In a conversation by the sidelines of AI Impact Summit 2026, New Delhi, he shared his vision.

He joined Celonis in January 2025. Mitra has about three 30 years of enterprise technology experience. He has worked with the big names like Oracle, Microsoft, and Indian system integrators. His direction is clear. He wants Celonis’ India to boost its growth engine by positioning process intelligence as a prerequisite to AI success.

“This is possibly the most exciting time of my career,” Mitra said. “While AI is the buzzword, most analysts mention that maybe 10 to 11 percent of AI prototypes become successful. What intrigued me was why the success rate is so low.”

His remarks after engaging with Celonis leadership were direct.

“Without that intelligence layer, it is very difficult for AI to give meaningful results. While it is very powerful, it still needs the business context. Process intelligence is a prerequisite to make AI successful.”

Building Celonis India from the ground up

When Mitra joined the India GTM role, his motto was effectively start from certain predefined priorities. He outlined three immediate priorities shaping Celonis’ India strategy.

First, talent. “We needed to have the right set of people in the right locations to address and meet customer requirements.”

Second, the evangelisation of the category. “We are a category creator and a brand leader in process intelligence. We had to evangelise the product platform and explain why it is so important as a precursor to AI.”

Third, innovation and partnerships. “Build solutions which will be relevant for the customers and work with partners to that effect.”

The strategy reflects a big shift in enterprise conversations where AI deployment is no longer experimental but strategic.

Contextualising process intelligence for Indian enterprises

For Mitra, contextualization begins with industry. “Each industry has its own nuances,” he explained, referencing automotive manufacturing, retail, BFSI, pharma, and consumer products.

While core processes such as procure to pay, order to cash, accounts receivable, and inventory management are globally almost the same, Indian enterprises operate within distinct regulatory and operational realities.

“Procure to pay will go through PR, PO, goods received, accounts payable and final payment. This process is universal. But what is important are the nuances for the Indian market.”

Celonis works closely with its value engineering teams and partners to build proof of value programs that reflect these local business conditions. Once the process intelligence layer is contextualised, it becomes the bridge to AI platforms.

“Once you have the process intelligence layer contextualised for India, then you can build those bridges with AI platforms and see how AI becomes very successful.”

Partner ecosystem at the core of adoption

Celonis’ India expansion is deeply partner-centric.

“We are helping customers improve their business processes. It is very important to have the advisory layer.”

Mitra describes Celonis as the MRI or X-ray of enterprise processes.

“We take data from transactional applications and build a digital twin. It is 100 per cent correct because it is based on organisational data.”

Most advisory firms traditionally rely on workshops and sample data. Celonis offers real-time process visibility based on complete enterprise data, making it a tool for consulting partners and global system integrators.

“Broadly, our product goes very well with the advisory function.”

Beyond large advisory firms, Celonis also partners with niche AI solution providers whose offerings complement use cases built on the process intelligence platform.

Are there barriers to process intelligence adoption in India?

He does not see major resistance. “We have reached that crossroads where almost every customer is looking at deploying AI.”

Because AI requires significant investment, enterprises are increasingly recognising that process intelligence must precede it. However, awareness remains a key focus area.

“Explaining the concept of process intelligence in India is important. Enterprises have been working on analytics platforms, but have not looked at process intelligence up close.”

On pricing, Celonis remains sensitive to local realities.

“We are conscious of Indian market realities and are working on price points suitable for the Indian market.”

Industry focus and large enterprise advantage

Celonis’ strongest traction globally has come from industries where productivity gains, cost takeouts, and AI deployments deliver measurable impact.

“We look at chosen industries where we have been globally very successful, like automotive manufacturing, CPG, retail, pharma and BFSI.”

Large enterprises present immediate scale advantages.

“We are talking about large volumes, large revenues, large elements of cost. So obviously the benefits will also be large.”

That said, digital-first organisations are also relevant, particularly in sectors such as e-commerce and quick commerce, where supply chain efficiency is mission-critical.

“It is all use case dependent. If a digital-first organisation is looking at improving supply chain or addressing duplicate invoices, they are a very important bet for us.”

India’s Role in Celonis’ Global Vision

India is central to Celonis’ long-term growth strategy.

“We have a Go India strategy. We are building capability for India and from India.”

This includes investments across product engineering, value engineering, services, and innovation labs. India is positioned not only as a sales growth lever but also as a capability hub.

On partner-led growth, Mitra is clear.

“We have a very strong partner focus. We are almost 100 per cent through partners.”

A major component of future growth will come from Global Capability Centres.

“We have more than 200 GCCs in India who are using Celonis. It can be large organisations like AstraZeneca, BMW, Mercedes and so on.”

As more global decision-making shifts to India, Celonis’ GCC GTM strategy will focus on adoption and expansion across multinational operations.

Conclusion: Making AI Work Through Process Intelligence

Kaushik Mitra’s theory is straightforward. Relying only on AI is not enough. Without an in-depth vision for business process functions, AI no doubt is powerful but it is more or less context blind.

“AI becomes an absolutely important investment, and process intelligence becomes an absolute important precursor to AI.”

With a focused India GTM strategy, strong advisory partnerships, GCC expansion, and localised industry contextualisation, Celonis is presenting itself as the intelligence layer enterprise that is needed before scaling AI.

In a market which is moving toward automation and AI-driven transformation, the competitive advantage lies not only in algorithms but also in understanding the process reality beneath them.

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