Since artificial intelligence positions businesses to be more agile, adaptive and prepared for future challenges, AI adoption is a critical component in today’s fast-paced and tech-driven environment.

As a result, Riverbed Technology LLC is accelerating AI adoption through products such as the Unified Agent, which is a suite of observability tools that uses full-fidelity data and automation to quickly detect, analyze and resolve IT issues, according to Dave Donatelli (pictured), chief executive officer of Riverbed. 

“As you know, customers hate agents; they don’t want to have lots of agents,” Donatelli said. “By having a Unified Agent with what we call modules that plug into it, you can get one agency when you go to the agent police. You only have one agent, but the different modules give you different technology. In this world where you get zero-trust networks, we have people working from home, traditional network monitoring no longer works. NPM+ takes that network monitoring, puts it on an endpoint, and by doing so you now get visibility again.”

Donatelli spoke with theCUBE Research’s Chief Analyst Dave Vellante, during an exclusive interview on theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s livestreaming studio. They discussed the need for enhanced AI adoption in the present digital space and how Riverbed is accelerating this momentum. (* Disclosure below.)

How automation accelerates AI adoption

Automation plays a critical role in AI adoption, as it streamlines data processing and minimizes barriers to implementation. This is because automation reduces human errors and eliminates mundane and repetitive tasks, according to Donatelli. 

“I was talking to a regional bank the other day,” he said. “In our case, they’re solving over 13,000 incidents that they used to have to use with humans now through full automation. That’s a more practical solution within a reasonable scope and scale that you can do but also offers real benefits to the end user. AI is important to what we do because it enables people to take the human element out of it. You need automation to help do that, and you need data to do that.”

Having a platform mindset plays an instrumental role in AI adoption because it eliminates blind spots and solves IT problems using automation. As a result, the Unified Agent plays a major role in Riverbed’s AI-powered platform, according to Donatelli.

“How do I get the most understanding of what’s happening in your environment so I can solve problems?” he said. “We have a new one coming out as well around Unified Communications – a module that goes into this Unified Agent. You can understand what’s happening in real time, and therefore, correct problems as they occur. The whole idea again is to make it easier for people to manage these very complex environments.”

Based on Riverbed’s “Global AI & Digital Experience Survey 2024”, overcoming AI adoption gaps is expected to happen in three years. This is because understanding them comes in handy when identifying the challenges organizations face when implementing AI technologies, according to Donatelli.

“Eighty-six percent of the people said that within three years they think they’re ready, and I think that’s a reasonable number,” he said. “There’s massive investment going in across from the producers of the technology. You have 94% of the people who want to consume it, i.e., the CEOs who are going to ask all their people when they budget, ‘What’s your AI budget and what are you doing for me?’ I think within three years, you’ll start to see real progress.”

How data fits into the AI adoption picture

Since enterprises are looking at how they can simplify their IT environments, AI discussions have been going through the roof. Nevertheless, Riverbed’s survey shows that the readiness gap stands at 72% based on factors such as data challenges, Donatelli pointed out. 

“If you take it up a level and you look at the CEOs, 94% of CEOs want to implement this, but if we go to the chart where you talk about what are the challenges, only 37% say they’re really ready for it,” he explained. “Only 40%, four out of 10, are confident in their data. I think it really comes down to data and practicality as one of the big concerns.”

Given that getting data right is the key for enhanced AI adoption, Rivebed sets the ball rolling through its closed-loop network. This is because data is quite sensitive since safety and security issues ought to be amicably addressed, according to Donatelli. 

“What are some of the inhibitors that people have around AI?” he asked. “They worry about safety in the sense of, if you look at large language models, people don’t want to interact their proprietary data with outside data, and then in essence, make their data public. Our system is a closed-loop system. It’s only the customer’s data working within their four walls, extremely secure, they don’t have to worry about that.”

Here’s theCUBE’s complete video interview with Dave Donatelli:

(* Disclosure: Riverbed Technology LLC. sponsored this segment of theCUBE. Neither Riverbed nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE