Companies Embrace AIOps as Strategic Imperative
October 14, 2021
Share this

Businesses are embracing artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to improve network performance and security, according to a new State of AIOps Study, conducted by ZK Research and Masergy.


The survey results demonstrate strong AIOps (AI for IT Operations) technology adoption rates and reveal a heightened level of confidence and trust as companies invest in AI to make their IT operations smarter, faster, and more secure.

"While digital transformation was already in motion prior to the pandemic, work-from-home (WFH) business models demand a whole new level of application performance and security measures to power and protect multi-cloud and hybrid work environments with no physical boundaries," said Terry Traina, CTO of Masergy. "The study reinforces that we are at a pivotal moment where automation and AIOps are no longer a nice to have but rather a strategic imperative for successful, secure business operations."

Key findings from the survey include:

More than half (64%) of companies surveyed are already using AIOps, with 55% using it across both network and security.

Moreover, 94% believe it is important or very important for AIOps to manage network and cloud application performance.

With more employees using third-party cloud applications from numerous locations and devices, IT leaders, tasked with securing corporate information everywhere, can't afford to trade WFH flexibility and performance for security. In fact, they are using AIOps to help manage those tradeoffs. The reasons companies use AIOps are tightly intertwined with network operational efficiencies, faster security threat identification, and faster security threat response reported as the top three.

"The vast majority of IT leaders have already embraced AIOps, and they're pointing to benefits such as productivity, cloud application performance, and security improvements," said Zeus Kerravala, founder and principal analyst, ZK Research. "Clearly, the business value of AIOps is justified. The era of AIOps is here, and anyone without a strategy will quickly be left behind."

More than two-thirds (73%) of survey participants identified software-defined network modernization and virtualization as the top IT investment required to prepare for AIOps. Today's businesses see SD-WAN's virtualization and orchestration benefits valuable in managing distributed networks and security policies. In fact, most businesses are putting more assets in the cloud, with 67% citing cloud migration as another top investment making them AI-ready.

A resounding majority (84%) see AIOps as the path to a fully automated network environment, with 86% expecting to have a fully automated network within 5 years.

Asked about the confidence they have in trusting AIOps tools to act on their own recommendations and create fully automated systems, 97% of respondents are confident they can be trusted.

Additionally 77% agree that AIOps performs better with a secure access service edge (SASE) architecture, where SD-WAN and security are all in one platform.

"A new wave of opportunity comes when SASE and AIOps unite in a single solution," said Traina. "IT executives need overarching insights where AI is deeply embedded into a unified platform, and this is precisely how Masergy is helping our customers transform with certainty."

Methodology: ZK Research conducted the study in August 2021 on behalf of Masergy, surveying more than 500 IT decision makers in US headquartered businesses across seven industries.

Share this

The Latest

March 19, 2024

If there's one thing we should tame in today's data-driven marketing landscape, this would be data debt, a silent menace threatening to undermine all the trust you've put in the data-driven decisions that guide your strategies. This blog aims to explore the true costs of data debt in marketing operations, offering four actionable strategies to mitigate them through enhanced marketing observability ...

March 18, 2024

Gartner has highlighted the top trends that will impact technology providers in 2024: Generative AI (GenAI) is dominating the technical and product agenda of nearly every tech provider ...

March 15, 2024

In MEAN TIME TO INSIGHT Episode 4 - Part 1, Shamus McGillicuddy, VP of Research, Network Infrastructure and Operations, at Enterprise Management Associates (EMA) discusses artificial intelligence and network management ...

March 14, 2024

The integration and maintenance of AI-enabled Software as a Service (SaaS) applications have emerged as pivotal points in enterprise AI implementation strategies, offering both significant challenges and promising benefits. Despite the enthusiasm surrounding AI's potential impact, the reality of its implementation presents hurdles. Currently, over 90% of enterprises are grappling with limitations in integrating AI into their tech stack ...

March 13, 2024

In the intricate landscape of IT infrastructure, one critical component often relegated to the back burner is Active Directory (AD) forest recovery — an oversight with costly consequences ...

March 12, 2024

eBPF is a technology that allows users to run custom programs inside the Linux kernel, which changes the behavior of the kernel and makes execution up to 10x faster(link is external) and more efficient for key parts of what makes our computing lives work. That includes observability, networking and security ...

March 11, 2024

Data mesh, an increasingly important decentralized approach to data architecture and organizational design, focuses on treating data as a product, emphasizing domain-oriented data ownership, self-service tools and federated governance. The 2024 State of the Data Lakehouse report from Dremio presents evidence of the growing adoption of data mesh architectures in enterprises ... The report highlights that the drive towards data mesh is increasingly becoming a business strategy to enhance agility and speed in problem-solving and innovation ...

March 07, 2024
In this digital era, consumers prefer a seamless user experience, and here, the significance of performance testing cannot be overstated. Application performance testing is essential in ensuring that your software products, websites, or other related systems operate seamlessly under varying conditions. However, the cost of poor performance extends beyond technical glitches and slow load times; it can directly affect customer satisfaction and brand reputation. Understand the tangible and intangible consequences of poor application performance and how it can affect your business ...
March 06, 2024

Too much traffic can crash a website ... That stampede of traffic is even more horrifying when it's part of a malicious denial of service attack ... These attacks are becoming more common, more sophisticated and increasingly tied to ransomware-style demands. So it's no wonder that the threat of DDoS remains one of the many things that keep IT and marketing leaders up at night ...

March 05, 2024

Today, applications serve as the backbone of businesses, and therefore, ensuring optimal performance has never been more critical. This is where application performance monitoring (APM) emerges as an indispensable tool, empowering organizations to safeguard their applications proactively, match user expectations, and drive growth. But APM is not without its challenges. Choosing to implement APM is a path that's not easily realized, even if it offers great benefits. This blog deals with the potential hurdles that may manifest when you actualize your APM strategy in your IT application environment ...