Even in its infancy, AI adoption is widespread. In fact, an August 2023 study by McKinsey found that 55 percent of organizations have adopted artificial intelligence for business functions.
To take advantage of AI, government agencies need infrastructure that supports it. This includes storage platforms that can keep up with the creation and movement of massive quantities of data, and processing power to handle the complex algorithms that AI relies on. Many agencies are turning to the cloud to meet these needs, while others are purchasing hardware with advanced capabilities, such as high-powered graphics processing units to support the demands of AI workloads.
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A Hybrid Future Requires Effective Strategy
As agencies include modernization initiatives in their IT infrastructure plans, the vast majority are implementing a hybrid model that includes cloud resources as well as on-premises hardware. According to a 2024 report from Flexera, 73 percent of organizations operate a hybrid cloud environment.
“This is something that’s happened over the past 10 years — this widespread adoption of public cloud — because people were getting services in the public cloud that they liked, but they needed to keep their on-premises environments as well,” Gibes says.
To see the best results, organizations need to approach their modernization initiatives strategically. An effective first step is to rightsize their cloud investments. For example, the public cloud offers flexibility and seamless scalability for workloads that have intermittent demand. Keeping workloads with steadier demand in an in-house data center can help organizations save money, provide greater control and address concerns about security and regulatory compliance.
“On-premises infrastructure usually has some characteristics that provide really good performance in certain circumstances,” Gibes says. “It also gives an agency greater control over security.”
Any effective modernization effort needs a clear, comprehensive strategy to guide it. Many agencies don’t know where to start, but a trusted partner can help. A third party can assess an organization’s current IT infrastructure and map out a path to the new capabilities the organization wants to enable. “There are a lot of paths that you can go down,” Cobb says. “Advisory services and assessments can help you along the path that’s right for you.”