Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Index finds AI is driving rapid container adoption while shadow IT and organisational silos create AI risks

NASDAQ-listed Nutanix, a leader in hybrid multicloud computing, today announced the Australian findings of its eighth annual Enterprise Cloud Index (ECI) survey and research report, which measures global enterprise progress with cloud adoption. This year’s report looked closely at the challenges IT local executives face as they navigate the rapid increase of Artificial Intelligence (AI) use and need for application and infrastructure modernisation in the enterprise.

The rapid rise of AI adoption in the enterprise over the last year is forcing a wave of infrastructure modernisation, as companies race to build and run applications more efficiently. In fact, containers have become a core component of the enterprise application strategy with 90 per cent of Australian respondents confirming AI is accelerating their adoption of containers to improve speed, reliability, and scalability.

“It is clear Australian organisations are ready to embrace AI, but this requires resilient, dependable, and well-governed infrastructure. Containerisation has emerged as a fundamental pillar in local AI and application strategies, but broader adoption requires a reimagining of the underlying infrastructure,” said Michael Alp (pictured), Managing Director for A/NZ at Nutanix. “Rather than manage a two-speed infrastructure stack, a common operating environment to manage both containerised and traditional workloads would address key concerns like shadow IT and data sovereignty.”

Key findings from this year’s report include:

• Shadow IT is creating AI challenges and security concerns: 72 per cent of respondents encounter AI applications or agents being implemented by employees in non-IT functions. Almost all (92 per cent) of local leaders believe unauthorised AI use introduces risk, including exposure of sensitive data and intellectual property. This highlights the need for closer collaboration between IT teams and business stakeholders to ensure AI deployments remain secure, compliant, and aligned with organisational goals.

• Organisational silos create new AI risks: While AI adoption is driving innovation, it is also introducing operational challenges. The vast majority (84% per cent) of local respondents believe silos between business units and IT make it difficult to effectively execute technology initiatives, slowing deployment timelines and increasing complexity.

• Agents unlock enormous potential with organisations: Most Australian IT executives (70 per cent) also anticipate that AI agents will improve productivity and efficiency. 62 per cent expect AI agents to enhance customer or employee experiences. Additionally, some believe that AI agents can play a deeper role, with 58 per cent seeing potential for AI agents to create new products, services, or revenue streams.

• Data sovereignty is non-negotiable: For 89 per cent of Australian respondents, data sovereignty is a high priority when making infrastructure decisions – including where to utilise containers. This is in comparison to 80 per cent worldwide. More than half (60 per cent) of local leaders feel the need to run their infrastructure domestically, whether on-premises or through a local cloud region, largely due to security or data protection concerns.

• Containers are the foundation of modern applications, with AI as the key driver: Organisations are turning to containers to support AI-enabled workloads and modern application development. 85 per cent of respondents expect the use of containers for applications to increase over the next three years, while 66 per cent say they are already building new and legacy applications in containers. Nine in 10 respondents believe AI is accelerating container adoption which highlights why enterprises need to evolve their infrastructure strategies to handle containerised workloads.

• The directive to deploy AI applications comes from the top, but infrastructure is not ready to fully support it: Almost half (48 per cent) of respondents anticipate that their organisation will have more than five AI-enabled applications in the next three years. Yet if their organisation needed to deploy AI workloads on-premises, 87 per cent believe their current infrastructure is not fully ready to support this.

For the eighth consecutive year, Nutanix commissioned a global research study to assess the state of cloud adoption, containerisation, and GenAI application deployment. Conducted in November 2025 by Wakefield Research, the survey gathered responses from 1,600 cloud, IT, and engineering executives with at least a manager-level title. Respondents represent organisations with 500 or more employees across Australia, Brazil, France, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, the Netherlands, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

To learn more about the report and findings, please download the full eighth annual ECI report, here.