AI Appreciation Day 2026: Trust and infrastructure emerge as the next frontier for AI, say experts

Sachin Panicker, Chief AI Officer, Fulcrum Digital

Most enterprises are no longer asking whether AI works. They've seen it work in a pilot. The harder question, and the one that actually determines value, is whether it works reliably across a live business process, month after month, with the same data mess, the same edge cases, and the same regulatory scrutiny that every other system in the enterprise has to survive. That's a far higher bar than a proof of concept clearing a demo.

On AI Appreciation Day, the most useful thing we can appreciate about AI isn't the technology itself. It's the discipline it's forcing on enterprises to finally fix the data and governance foundations they should have fixed years ago.

Rakesh Kumar, Infrastructure Solution Head, Vertiv

On a day meant to celebrate AI's progress, it's worth remembering that none of it works without the infrastructure layer underneath. High-density computing puts real strain on power and cooling systems, and getting that right is what actually lets AI scale reliably. This layer determines whether AI adoption holds up outside a lab environment. That's the foundation we build at Vertiv.

Aaron Bugal, Field CISO, APJ, Sophos

While AI Appreciation Day is 'celebration' of the benefits of AI, it also serves as a timely reminder about the responsibility that comes with using it securely and safely.

There is no question that AI is changing cybersecurity. It helps defenders analyse threats faster and respond more efficiently, but also gives cybercriminals new ways to scale familiar attacks. The technology is evolving rapidly, yet the fundamentals of good cybersecurity remain remarkably consistent.

Even in an era of highly sophisticated technologies available to attackers, 79% of ransomware attacks in the APJ region still begin with identity-based techniques such as phishing, malicious emails and compromised credentials - according to the finding of the Sophos Ransomware Report released today. This shows that AI isn't replacing the tactics attackers rely on but it is making them faster, more convincing and easier to execute at scale.

AI is an incredibly powerful tool, but like any tool, its value depends on how it's used. The organisations that will benefit most are those using AI to strengthen human expertise, accelerate response and build resilience, rather than assuming technology alone will solve their cybersecurity challenges.

Naresh Rao, VP & Sales Head, Issuance Products, Giesecke+Devrient India Pvt. Ltd.

AI is becoming the intelligence behind the next generation of secure card payments. From predictive risk scoring to biometric authentication, tokenisation and secure digital card issuance, AI is helping banks detect threats earlier, strengthen trust and deliver seamless payment experiences. As digital payments continue to evolve, AI will be central to making security more proactive, adaptive and resilient.

Nikhil Parambath, Regional Vice President Asia, BlackLine

CFOs today don’t need more artificial intelligence (AI) hype; they need AI they can trust. In India, the conversation is moving from AI adoption to AI accountability, with finance leaders expected to show that automation can deliver speed and efficiency without compromising control, governance or auditability.

On the occasion of AI Appreciation Day, it’s worth recognising that the next phase of finance transformation will belong to organisations that can make AI transparent, explainable and auditable. As finance teams in India manage increasingly complex operations across Global Capability Centres (GCCs), multiple entities and high transaction volumes, trust in AI will matter just as much as its intelligence.

This is where Agentic Financial Operations - AI that operates within governed financial workflows and human oversight - and a glass box approach, where every AI-driven recommendation is visible, traceable and accountable, can help finance leaders scale with confidence while preserving the integrity that modern finance demands.

Michael Sell, Senior Vice President and Global Head of Institutional Outreach at the Global Association of Risk Professionals (GARP)

AI Appreciation Day is an opportunity to recognize not only how artificial intelligence is transforming business, but also the responsibility that comes with its growing use. As AI becomes embedded in everyday decision-making, organizations must focus not only on accelerating adoption but also on building governance processes for responsible, trustworthy use of AI.

The future of AI will be shaped as much by human judgment as by technological capability. Professionals who can critically evaluate AI-generated insights, understand their limitations, and make risk-informed decisions will be essential to realizing AI's full potential. Resilient organizations in the AI era won't simply build smarter AI. They'll build smart decision-making processes supported by AI that include informed humans in the loop.

Shafi Shoukath, Founder & Chairman, WOI.eco

India added a record fifty-five thousand recognised startups last year, yet we capture under five percent of global startup funding while holding eighteen percent of the world's population. AI closes that gap - not gradually, but violently fast. What a 5,000-person enterprise does through departments, a lean AI-first startup now does through systems running around the clock. Five years of growth is compressing into one. But speed without responsibility is just recklessness at scale - how we build with AI will matter as much as how fast. This is a once-in-a-generation window, and it won't stay open. The founders who build with AI-native speed, intensity, and integrity today will be the category leaders the world studies tomorrow.

Dhananjay Ganjoo, Managing Director, India, and SAARC

Every AI application depends on a continuous flow of APIs, inference requests, and model interactions, where even minor delays, downtime or security gaps can directly impact business outcomes. Keeping these AI applications fast, resilient, and secure requires more than powerful models it requires an application delivery and security architecture purpose-built for AI.

As AI workloads grow, APIs connect AI models with enterprise applications and data, while application delivery intelligently manages AI traffic to maintain low latency, optimise performance and ensure high availability. AI gateways provide the control point to inspect prompts, govern model interactions, and enforce runtime guardrails, while workload security protects AI applications and inference services from threats such as prompt injection, API abuse, and data leakage. Together, these capabilities ensure AI applications remain performant, resilient, and secure in production environments.

At F5, we see application delivery and security as the foundation for production AI, enabling organisations to confidently deploy and scale AI applications without compromising performance, resilience, or security.

Amit Agrawal, President, Techno Digital

AI Appreciation Day shouldn’t be about applauding models; it should be about recognizing the people, infrastructure and operational discipline that turn them into reliable business outcomes. The deployments creating lasting value are often the least glamorous: predictive maintenance reducing unplanned downtime by 30-50%; AI‑assisted security operations shrinking response times from hours to minutes; intelligent document processing accelerating onboarding by 40-60%; and demand forecasting improving product availability while reducing working capital.

Those outcomes don’t come from a smarter model alone. They come from validated environments where high‑performance compute, distributed low‑latency inference, resilient power, secure connectivity, and operational runbooks operate as a single system. That infrastructure discipline is what separates impressive pilots from enterprise‑scale production.

At Techno Digital, we’ve built our AI infrastructure strategy around that reality, combining hyperscale AI‑ready campuses with an interconnected, distributed edge network so enterprises and partners can run AI closer to users, with the performance, resilience and governance required for production. The next competitive advantage won’t be defined by model accuracy alone; it will belong to organizations that can consistently deliver trusted, low‑latency, measurable business outcomes at scale.

Ankur Kanaglekar, Vice President – India, Thales

As we celebrate AI Appreciation Day, it is important to recognise that AI's true potential will not be measured by how quickly it is adopted, but by how much it can be trusted. Whether helping cyber experts respond to increasingly sophisticated attacks, supporting defence operators in mission-critical decisions, assisting air traffic management or protecting critical infrastructure, AI must deliver more than performance: it must be secure, transparent, resilient and remain under meaningful human oversight.

At Thales, we believe the future belongs to AI that empowers people to make faster, better-informed decisions while protecting critical data, systems and operations. This vision is brought to life through cortAIx, Thales' global trusted AI accelerator, which combines advanced AI capabilities with cybersecurity, data protection and human-centric governance to help organisations worldwide deploy AI with confidence across defense, aerospace, cyber and digital identity. With AI embedded in more than 100 products and services and supported by the expertise of over 800 AI specialists, Thales is committed to advancing trusted AI that not only addresses today's challenges but also helps build a more secure, sovereign, and resilient digital future.