95% of companies face system integration challenges

A recent survey of over a thousand IT leaders worldwide shows that 95% of organizations report facing integration challenges between their systems, and on average, only 29% of the applications used by a company are actually connected to each other. The path to avoiding being one of these statistics involves three fronts: accurately mapping how many systems the company actually uses (the global average is 897 applications per organization), prioritizing the integration of systems that generate the most critical data for decision-making, and adopting a centralized integration layer, such as an iPaaS, instead of multiplying point-in-time and undocumented integrations.

Data from September 3, 2026 , 5-minute read. By: Skyone

Why does systems integration remain such a widespread problem?

The growth in the number of applications used by a company has not stopped. Research in the integration sector shows that the average number of systems per organization increased from 976 in 2022 to 897 in 2025, a number that is still high enough to make manual, point-to-point integration practically unfeasible. When each new system is connected to the others in an isolated and non-standardized way, the result is a web of integrations that are difficult to maintain, document, or even fully map.

What does this 95% figure actually mean in practice?

This doesn't mean that 95% of companies have "no integration at all," it means that the existing integration is insufficient, unreliable, or doesn't cover what the company truly needs. The main symptoms identified by this type of survey usually include:

IT teams are spending a significant portion of their time simply designing, building, and testing custom integrations between systems;
Low percentage of applications effectively connected to each other (research indicates an average of 29%);
Difficulty in having a single, reliable view of the customer, inventory, or operations, because the data is scattered across systems that don't communicate with each other;
Integration projects that exceed the planned timeframe and budget.

Why does this also hinder the adoption of AI?

A relevant finding from the same report: 80% of companies cite data integration as one of the biggest obstacles to AI adoption. This makes sense; an AI agent, however sophisticated, can only make good decisions if it has access to up-to-date and reliable data from different systems. Without integration, AI ends up operating with a partial (or outdated) view of the company's reality, which directly compromises the quality of the responses and automations generated.

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What can you do to avoid becoming one of those statistics?

Practice	Why does it reduce the problem?
Map all applications that are actually in use	Many companies underestimate how many systems they use; you can't integrate what isn't mapped
Prioritize based on data criticality, not order of arrival	Not all integrations have the same impact; starting with the systems that most heavily inform strategic decisions generates a faster return
Centralize integration in a single layer (iPaaS)	It avoids the proliferation of point integrations, each with its own logic and maintenance
Document and monitor each active integration	It reduces the risk of "ghost integrations" whose purpose is unknown, but which continue to consume resources
Treat integration as part of the data strategy, not as a one-off project	Companies that treat integration as an ongoing process, rather than a project that "ends," sustain the connection between systems for longer

How can an integration platform help reverse this scenario?

A common symptom in companies that suffer most from this problem is the reliance on custom integrations, built one by one, without standardization or reuse, which is exactly the opposite of what an iPaaS platform solves. This is the role of Skyone Studio: by combining iPaaS, data organization (lakehouse), and AI agents in a single layer, it allows connecting systems such as ERPs (TOTVS, SAP) and CRMs (Salesforce, HubSpot) through ready-made connectors, instead of depending on a new customized integration for each new system the company starts using.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is systems integration only a problem for large companies? No. Although large companies tend to use more applications, smaller companies also accumulate isolated systems over time. The difference is that, with fewer IT resources available, the impact of a poorly resolved integration is usually felt even faster in day-to-day operations.

How many applications does a company use, on average, today? According to recent industry surveys, the global average is 897 applications per organization, with 45% of companies using more than 1,000 different systems.

Why are only 29% of applications integrated, on average? Because integrating system to system, in a customized way, is expensive and slow. Most companies prioritize only the most urgent or visible integrations, leaving the rest of the application ecosystem disconnected.

Is solving data integration a prerequisite for truly using AI in business? In practice, yes. An AI agent without access to integrated and up-to-date data tends to generate responses based on incomplete information, which is why integration is often cited as one of the main obstacles to realizing the benefits of AI in companies.