The latest Cloud Complexity Report from NetApp offers a compelling glimpse into the evolving landscape of AI adoption and cloud infrastructure across industries and regions. The findings point to a growing divide between AI leaders and AI laggards, with clear implications for business strategy and competitiveness in the digital age.
I had the opportunity to talk with NetApp’s chief marketing officer, Gabie Boko, and chief technical officer for cloud, Jonsi Stefansson, about what they learned from the report (you can watch a recording of our conversation on LinkedIn).
Ms. Boko told me last year’s report revealed challenges with IT organizations focused on leadership pressure to reduce costs and speed time to ROI while managing data-dependent workloads, especially in hybrid multi-cloud environments.
It’s not surprising, she told me, that this year’s research showed that global priorities have shifted while progress is being made. A significant shift is the increasing urgency to build and deploy AI at scale, which is now a driving force for cloud adoption.
Perhaps not surprisingly, these AI workloads also create much of the cloud complexity IT teams need to navigate.
The AI Divide
NetApp found a significant gap in AI adoption, readiness, and deployment among different regions, industries, and company sizes. This divide separates AI leaders—those actively leveraging AI at scale—from AI laggards, those who are slower to adopt or implement AI technologies.
For example, some industries, like technology, banking and financial services, and manufacturing, lead on the AI adoption curve. The technology sector boasts the highest adoption rates, with 70% of AI projects in pilot or production phases.
Meanwhile, industries like healthcare and media and entertainment lag with much lower adoption rates. The report points to challenges in integrating AI or regulatory constraints.
There are similar differences when looking at AI adoption from a geography-based perspective. NetApp found that AI leaders are typically concentrated in countries with advanced technology infrastructure, such as India, Singapore, the UK, and the USA. About 60% of AI projects in these regions are already operational or in pilot.
Conversely, AI-lagging countries, such as Spain, Australia/New Zealand, Germany, and Japan, have only about 36% of AI projects in similar stages.
The AI divide demonstrates that while some regions, industries, and larger companies embrace AI’s potential, others need to catch up, or face barriers to adoption. Addressing this divide requires a concerted effort to support AI innovation, improve infrastructure, and encourage broader adoption across various sectors and regions.
Analyst’s Take
NetApp’s research covers far more than just AI. It discusses the operational concerns facing IT organizations, touching on everything from cloud ops to cybersecurity, governance, and compliance.
The report contains a lot of insightful data, all clearly revealing that managing a hybrid-cloud infrastructure, despite all its benefits, continues to be a complex undertaking.
Addressing the challenges of deploying and managing IT infrastructure requires working with a robust set of trusted partners. Given that modern digital transformation is a data-first endeavor, it makes sense that NetApp, a company whose roots lay in solving enterprise data challenges, sponsors efforts like the Cloud Complexity Report. It’s precisely this type of primary research that allows technology companies to provide the solutions most needed by IT organizations.
Overall, the Cloud Complexity Report paints a picture of a rapidly evolving AI landscape, one divided into leaders and laggards. As global companies increase investments in AI and cloud infrastructure, those who fail to keep pace risk falling behind in an increasingly competitive market. The message is clear: to thrive in the age of AI, businesses must prioritize unified data infrastructure and robust cloud strategies.
Disclosure: Steve McDowell is an industry analyst, and NAND Research is an industry analyst firm that engages in, or has engaged in, research, analysis and advisory services with many technology companies, including those mentioned in this article. Mr. McDowell does not hold any equity positions with any company mentioned in this article.
