Expert Roundup  ·  Enterprise IT & AI

What Emerging Technology Will Have the Biggest Impact on Enterprise IT in the Next 24 Months?

2026 · 8 Thought Leaders · 1 Question

Enterprise IT is evolving at a breakneck pace, driven by a wave of innovation that shows no signs of slowing down. We asked eight industry experts one central question — and their answers reveal where the real transformation is heading.

What emerging technology will have the biggest impact on enterprise IT in the next 24 months?

Amiram Shachar

Amiram Shachar

Co-Founder and CEO

Upwind

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Over the next 24 months, the most disruptive trend in enterprise IT will be a shift in how enterprises assess cloud risks — moving from static configuration control to real-time, usage-based, and runtime-driven risk analysis. Historically, IT and security teams have focused on scanning for vulnerabilities in a pre-deployment or periodic fashion. However, as cloud environments become more dynamic and ephemeral, this approach is no longer sufficient.

The real impact will come from technologies that can distinguish between a theoretical vulnerability and an active, exploitable risk in the context of how the application is actually running.

This transition will allow teams to cut through the noise of thousands of alerts and focus on what truly matters. Enterprises that don't develop their security models to operate at runtime will be left behind.

Nikhil Chandrashekar

Nikhil Chandrashekar

Senior Manager, Marketing

Tata Communications

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Agentic AI is set to disrupt enterprise IT the most in the next 24 months. Unlike traditional GenAI, agentic systems don't just generate — they act. They make decisions, call APIs, and trigger workflows autonomously. This will shift IT from managing tools to managing outcomes, turning infrastructure into a self-healing, self-optimizing ecosystem. The challenge? Ensuring robust governance and observability as AI moves from 'assistant' to 'agent.'

Sunitha Rao

Sunitha Rao

SVP & GM, Hybrid Cloud and Software-Defined Storage

Hitachi Vantara

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As a cybersecurity practitioner, I believe the next major disruption will be the widespread adoption of generative AI tools in security. This will allow security teams to shift from a reactive to a proactive posture by automating threat hunting, incident response, and vulnerability management. This will also require organizations to invest in robust data management and governance practices to ensure that AI models are trained on high-quality, trustworthy data.

Pushkar Sharma

Pushkar Sharma

Director of Product Management

Fastly

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API security is poised to become one of the most critical disruptors in enterprise IT over the next 24 months, particularly as businesses adopt decentralized architectures and agentic AI. As APIs increasingly serve as the connective layer between cloud services, data sources, and AI agents, they are also becoming the primary attack vector for cyber threats.

Traditional perimeter-based security models are no longer sufficient. Organizations must adopt API-first security strategies that include real-time monitoring, behavior-based threat detection, and dynamic authorization.

Himabindu Venganur

Himabindu Venganur

Oracle Integration Cloud Architect, OCFO

Office of the CFO, DC

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A leading candidate for the most disruptive technology trend in enterprise IT over the next 12–24 months is AI-driven automation, especially with the rise of GenAI copilots. These tools are quickly transforming software development, customer service, data analysis, and operations. Enterprises are incorporating AI into workflows to increase productivity, cut costs, and improve decision-making.

As models become more domain-specific and when businesses integrate them with their proprietary data, the impact will grow — changing not just how IT functions, but how businesses compete.

Vasdev Gullapalli

Vasdev Gullapalli

Senior Staff Site Reliability Engineer/Manager

Qualcomm

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The convergence of Generative AI and Autonomous Security Orchestration is set to disrupt enterprise IT like never before. This shift from reactive to self-defending security models will redefine compliance, endpoint protection, and operational resilience. Over the next 24 months, organizations that delay embracing this evolution risk being overwhelmed by increasingly intelligent and adaptive cyber threats.

Narasimha Rao Alugoju

Narasimha Rao Alugoju

Applications Systems Architect Advisor

Peraton

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Cloud-native generative AI agents will be the single biggest disruptor in enterprise IT over the next 18 months — but only for firms that first modernize onto a unified cloud data platform.

Emmanuel Bennoit

Emmanuel Bennoit

Cybersecurity Expert

Valiantys

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The most significant disruption to enterprise IT over the next 12 to 24 months will undoubtedly come from artificial intelligence in cybersecurity. This isn't just about new tools — it's a profound shift on both sides of the digital battleground. On one hand, AI is rapidly becoming a formidable weapon for cybercriminals. Generative AI can create highly convincing phishing attacks at scale, making social engineering more potent than ever. We're also seeing AI used to automate vulnerability discovery and develop advanced, polymorphic malware that adapts to evade traditional defenses.

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