Hitachi Vantara Report: Most Enterprises Unprepared for GenAI Success

Enterprises are increasingly adopting Generative AI, but despite the growing interest and enthusiasm in the technology, significant challenges remain. A study by the Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) sponsored by Hitachi Vantara reveals that most organizations lack the necessary infrastructure and policies to achieve success.

The survey of over 800 IT,  business leaders, and data-centric practitioners across the globe revealed that an overwhelming majority (97%) of enterprises now consider GenAI to be one of their top five priorities, with U.S. companies 35% more likely to consider GenAI as the top priority compared to European respondents. 

The report highlights the critical role of infrastructure in successful GenAI adoption for enterprises. According to the report, enterprises are looking to leverage the power of GenAI to improve accuracy (56%), keep pace with technological advancements (47%), and address compliance and/or regulatory requirements (43%). However, only one in three (37%) of respondents believe that their company’s infrastructure and data ecosystem is well-suited for implementing GenAI solutions. 

C-level executives are about 1.3 times more likely to admit that their company’s data ecosystem needs improvement compared to individuals further down the corporate ladder. According to Hitachi, 88% of organizations said they have started cross-functional collaboration among data science, IT, and business teams to utilize GenAI better.

The reports’ findings highlight data security, the ability to ensure data quality, and the flexibility of data infrastructure components as the most important characteristics in enterprise data and storage infrastructure. 

“Enterprises are clearly jumping on the GenAI bandwagon, which is not surprising, but it’s also clear that the foundation for successful GenAI use is not yet built and its full potential cannot be realized,” said Hitachi Vantara’s chief technology officer, Ayman Abouelwafa. “Unlocking the true power of GenAI, however, requires a strong foundation with a robust and secure infrastructure that can handle the demands of this powerful technology.”

Security, cost, and data quality are the top concerns for organizations in storing and managing data related to GenAI initiatives. Organizations continue to grapple with security challenges such as data privacy, potential misuse or abuse of GenAI, unauthorized access, and confidentiality. 

The potential for GenAI to deliver inaccurate responses also remains a concern. A vast majority (86%) of organizations are planning on leveraging Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) solutions to some extent to mitigate this challenge of inaccurate responses. 

With 96% of enterprises seeking alternatives to proprietary LLMs, it is driving an open-source model movement. The report shows that organizations are seeking lower-cost options to get started with GenAI. However, as organizations gain more expertise over time, they are 6 times more likely to adopt proprietary models in the long term to help them achieve competitive differentiation.

The lack of enterprise AI infrastructure was also highlighted in “The State of AI Infrastructure at Scale 2024” by ClearML. The report identified significant challenges in AI infrastructure, particularly regarding compute management and optimization. 

Hitachi Vantara is a wholly owned subsidiary of Hitachi, Ltd, specializing in data storage, infrastructure, and hybrid cloud management solutions. The company recently partnered with NVIDIA to create a new portfolio of Industrial AI solutions. It also entered into a strategic collaboration with Cisco earlier this year to introduce a suite of hybrid cloud services to address ongoing data management challenges. 

The Hitachi report is a valuable resource, especially for business decision-makers, to understand the importance of building a robust, scalable, and secure infrastructure to maximize GenAI performance and build trust within their organization. 

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