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CIO Peer Perspective — Engineering Sustainable AI Economics in the Agentic Era

Heather Herbst, Jevin Jensen, Martina Longo, Robert Parker — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC study highlights the growing complexity of AI cost structures, the impact of agentic AI on resource consumption, and the need for robust cost governance. As AI becomes integral to enterprise operations, CIOs are shifting focus from rapid deployment to engineering sustainable AI economics. Best practices include early FinOps integration, architectural optimization, and disciplined vendor management to ensure measurable business value and cost efficiency as AI adoption scales.

“The future of AI leadership isn’t about deploying the fastest—it’s about engineering the most sustainable economics in an era where every token counts,” says Heather Herbst, research director, CFO Buyer Insights at IDC.

Cisco Partner of the Year Award and BT International: The Importance of a Wide Portfolio and Owning the Full Life Cycle

Chris Barnard — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Market Note examines the importance of partner awards handed out by networking infrastructure vendors. It focuses on Cisco selecting BT International as its Global Networking Partner of the Year. "Key elements in this decision include the scale of BT International, its ability to layer services on top of Cisco equipment, and its early embrace of the new Cisco Partner program. BT International also leverages Cisco equipment in Global Fabric, a multi-service, multicloud network platform designed to transform the economics, quality, and competitiveness of its wide array of solutions," said Chris Barnard, VP Networking and Infrastructure Services, IDC.

Nuclear’s Colocation Moment: Reading the Signal Behind the July 2026 Criticality Milestones

Olga Yashkova — Tue, 28 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Market Perspective examines how Executive Order 14301 and the Department of Energy’s accelerated Reactor Pilot Program, which saw four advanced reactors achieve criticality by July 4, 2026, are reshaping colocation providers’ energy strategies. It highlights nuclear’s emerging role alongside renewables, evolving financing models, and the execution risks datacenter operators face as they pursue small modular reactor (SMR) power to address grid constraints, sustainability goals, and regulatory changes.

“We are seeing real momentum behind nuclear in the datacenter clean energy mix, and hitting four criticality milestones ahead of the July 4 deadline is a meaningful proof point. But there’s still a gap between a test reactor going critical and a commercial reactor delivering power to a live campus. That said, the timeline for closing that gap looks shorter than it did even a year ago,” says Olga Yashkova, research manager, Worldwide Telecommunications Services, IDC.

Beyond Check the Box: Choosing a Security Framework Built for AI Risk, Quantum Threat, Regulatory, and Your Organization's Reality

Philip D. Harris, CISSP, CCSK — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Perspective updates IDC's foundational guidance on framework selection to reflect a materially changed landscape: NIST CSF 2.0 expanded scope and added a Govern function in 2024; DORA became applicable to approximately 22,000 EU financial entities in January 2025; and PCI DSS v4.0 retired the legacy standard in March 2024. Security framework selection is a risk management decision, not a technical checklist. Organizations that have not revisited their framework strategy since 2022 are likely operating against outdated assumptions about both the available options and the regulatory obligations that may constrain — or drive — their choice.

Two criteria that did not exist as first-order considerations in 2022 now demand explicit attention. AI adoption has introduced new attack surfaces — model poisoning, prompt injection, and agentic system risks — for which NIST published a draft Cyber AI Profile in December 2025. Post-quantum cryptography (PQC) has moved from theoretical concern to operational imperative, with NIST finalizing three PQC standards in August 2024 and regulators establishing migration deadlines. Organizations that embed both considerations into their framework selection process now will be substantially better positioned than those that treat them as future-state concerns.

"The right security framework is a critical factor in adequately managing security risks not only present today but also risks that could appear in the future," says Phil Harris, research director, Cybersecurity GRC Solutions at IDC. "The 2026 landscape demands that organizations evaluate AI governance and post-quantum cryptography readiness as first-order criteria, not future-state considerations. Organizations that apply a structured, criteria-driven approach, supported by capable GRC technology, will make framework choices that are the right fit today and resilient enough to evolve as the threat and regulatory landscape continues to change."

Cinven's Acquisition of Salsify: A Bet on a Retail Network Marketed as a Bet on Bots

Heather Hershey — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Hewlett Packard Enterprise Advances Simulation and AI Infrastructure Across Supercomputing and Enterprise Environments

Madhumitha Sathish, Peter Rutten — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Hewlett Packard Enterprise’s (HPE) announcements at ISC 2026 and HPE Discover 2026 highlight an approach centered on bringing together modeling, simulation, and AI capabilities within integrated infrastructure environments delivered through hybrid and private cloud models. Across its portfolio, which includes supercomputing systems, AI Factory solutions, and GreenLake, HPE demonstrates how accelerated computing, networking, and software can be combined to support simulation workflows alongside AI-driven data processing and analysis. Enterprise deployments, cloud-scale environments with partners such as Vultr, and continued advancements in HPE Cray supercomputing platforms reflect how these capabilities are being applied to address a range of data-intensive use cases. Overall, HPE’s announcements emphasize the role of unified infrastructure in enabling organizations to run complex workloads while maintaining performance, control, and scalability.

IDC views this direction as representative of how organizations are increasingly applying simulation and AI capabilities together to support engineering, research, and operational objectives. As these workloads continue to grow in complexity and scale, integrated environments that combine high-performance compute, networking, and software are expected to play an important role. Hybrid deployment models, along with consumption-based approaches, provide flexibility for organizations to deploy these capabilities while maintaining governance and operational oversight.

“Across HPE’s portfolio, including supercomputing with HPE Cray, AI Factory solutions, networking, and hybrid cloud, modeling, simulation, and AI capabilities are increasingly brought together, building on the company’s long-standing HPC expertise to support performance-intensive workloads across the energy, manufacturing, healthcare and life sciences, financial services, and public sector industries,” says Madhumitha Sathish, research manager, IDC.

IDC Directions Tokyo 2026：成長を導くAIインフラ－次の10年の競争力を左右するインフラ戦略とソブリンAI

Yukihisa Hode, Shinya Kato — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

本Conference Proceeding: Tech BuyerはIDC Japan、AI and Automationのシニアリサーチマネージャーである加藤慎也と同社Infrastructure, Imaging & Devicesのリサーチマーネジャーである宝出幸久による講演の内容をプレゼンテーションスライドと音声ファイルによって提供するものである。

IDC Survey Spotlight: Do AI and Edge Interconnects Gain Ground as Investment Drivers Shift?

Ajeet Das — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Survey Spotlight presents the shift in investment drivers to support the evolving use cases for AI and edge interconnect. It contains data from IDC's Worldwide Telco DX Network Infrastructure and Cloud Survey, April 2026, based on the response from 318 communications service providers worldwide.

"AI-related bandwidth growth remains the leading driver of optical network investments today and over the next three years. At the same time, edge datacenter interconnects show the strongest momentum, rising significantly in priority as operators expand AI ecosystems beyond core facilities," Ajeet Das, research director, Telecom Infrastructure at IDC.

IDC Survey Spotlight: How Are Enterprises Upgrading the Edge to Support AI and ML Workloads?

Olga Yashkova — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

This IDC Survey Spotlight highlights the results of IDC’s 2025 EdgeView Survey. Enterprises know that not all of their edge locations are ready for AI. IDC’s 2025 EdgeView Survey (n = 800) asked enterprise IT leaders what it will take to run AI and ML workloads at the edge, and the answers point to a buildout most organizations are not equipped to handle alone. IDC believes colocation will play an increasingly important role in enabling faster deployment of accelerator-heavy edge AI workloads, while enterprises modernize their distributed infrastructure footprints.

IDC Survey Spotlight: Which AI Type Delivers the Most Value at Each Stage of the ESG Data Life Cycle?

Bjoern Stengel — Mon, 27 Jul 2026 04:00:00 GMT

Success in AI-powered ESG data management hinges on matching the right type of AI to each stage of the ESG data life cycle, rather than betting on a single technology. While predictive AI is the most cited “most beneficial” type overall (32% weighted), it only leads 2 of 6 life cycle stages, with agentic AI winning on strategy and risk, and interpretive AI on regulatory intelligence. Budget commitment has moved well past experimentation, as most organizations already allocate a quarter or more of their AI budget to sustainability-related tasks, and many plan to increase that investment further.

This IDC Survey Spotlight draws on IDC’s 2026 AI and Sustainability Survey (n = 1,570), mapping which AI types deliver the most value at each ESG management stage.