“Acquisitions and partnerships” came in as a top-three priority for 41% of them - behind only cost management (58%) and revenue uplift (50%), and ahead of both AI deployment and business transformation.

Here’s what stood out to me, and what I think it means for those of us building alliances.

CEOs treat buying and partnering as two routes to the same destination: capability they don’t have time to build

Here is why.

42% of CEOs pursuing M&A want capabilities and intellectual capital — rising to 54% at the largest firms and above 55% in the fastest-moving sectors.

In their words:

“Buying is faster than building, and is sometimes more effective, setting companies up to leapfrog the competition.”

Partnerships are the non-binding version of that same move.

Same speed, same access to technology, data, and markets — with less capital at risk and less to integrate. When an acquisition is too costly or too slow, a co-sell or marketplace motion gets a CEO most of the way there.

Two forces make this urgent.

First, 65% of CEOs rank competitive disruption as a top-three opportunity — higher than any other opportunity in the survey.

They’re playing offense, and offense needs capability fast.

Second, AI is pulling deployment leaders away from the pack.

Two-thirds of companies are still stuck in pilots, but those scaling AI across two or more use cases are 3x more likely to report returns that meet or beat expectations (49% versus 15%).

Moving from pilot to production is exactly where cloud and implementation partners prove their worth.

Three things I’d take from this for alliance leaders:

1. Lead every partnership case with the growth number — revenue, customer access, time-to-value — not just relationship strength

2. Frame partnerships as the lower-risk path to the capability CEOs are otherwise trying to buy

3. Position your ecosystem as the shortest route from AI pilot to deployed outcome

Partnerships have earned a seat at the growth table. The question is whether you show up speaking the CEO’s language.

Source: The CEO Agenda 2026