IBM has announced significant updates to IBM Bob, enhancing its capabilities to support enterprise needs with advanced multi-agent features, integrated AI analytics, and ready-to-deploy workflows for system modernisation.
“Bob is the platform enterprise customers have been asking for,” said Neel Sundaresan, GM, Automation and AI, IBM. “The bar for enterprise AI is no longer a better coding assistant. It’s an end-to-end agentic development partner that works inside any system development teams already use, with the governance, security, and cost controls enterprises require.”
New IBM Bob updates
IBM Bob now offers the following:
- Built-in usage visibility and cost optimisation: Users can now access Bobalytics, a new feature that helps them monitor consumption, allocate resources and maintain oversight so they can scale AI according to their internal mandates.
- Parallel, model-native tool calling: Bob now allows models to request several tools in one turn and run them together.
- Subagents manage context at scale: Bob subagents can now handle complex work in an isolated context to deliver fast responses while helping manage cost.
“Using IBM Bob,” explained Kevin Sligar, chief technical architect at Jack Henry, “our developers can accelerate RPG development workflows, improve code quality, and gain deeper insights into decades of accumulated system knowledge while gaining efficiency in enhancement efforts.”
Availability
The latest version of IBM Bob is available for download at bob.ibm.com/download.
Bob’s first three premium packages, which are now available, include:
- IBM Z: Bob brings AI-native application modernisation to IBM Z for the first time with COBOL and PL/I modernisation and JCL analysis.
- IBM i: Bob is bringing AI-native development to mission-critical operations at enterprises worldwide for the first time, with remote file system integration, IBM i-specific modes and tools, and workflows built around the operational patterns of IBM i shops.
- Java Modernisation: Bob delivers AI-guided workflows for Java modernisation, including migration to Java 25, large-scale refactoring and dependency analysis at scale.
