AIOps is in full swing across enterprises of all sizes, with more than 90% of organizations in active deployment. Although the discipline is still relatively new to IT (more than 60% of the implementations are less than two years in), there are big wins to be had—both quantifiable and qualitative. In fact, AIOps has a very high success rate (95%) and almost universally pays for itself. These slides—based on the research webinar from leading IT research firm Enterprise Management Associates (EMA)--examine the characteristics that are common to the 21% who rate the impact of AIOps on the IT/business relationship as “transformational.”

1. AI(work)Ops 2021:
The State of AIOps
Valerie O’Connell
Research Director
Digital Service Executions
voconnell@enterprisemanagement.com

2. Watch the On-Demand Webinar
• AI(work)Ops 2021: The State of AIOps On-Demand Webinar:
https://info.enterprisemanagement.com/a-research-view-of-aiops-implementations-ws
• Check out upcoming webinars from EMA here:
https://www.enterprisemanagement.com/freeResearch

3. Sponsors make EMA’s independent field research possible
© 2021 Enterprise Management Associates, Inc. 3
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EMA AIOps Radar 2020

4. © 2021 Enterprise Management Associates, Inc. 4
Today, vendor AIOps capabilities exceed common enterprise demands.
Actual deployments and overall use currently lag well behind the
potential of existing platforms.
AIOps is still quite early as an IT initiative (61% < 2years)
AIOps and automation are inextricably linked…
…and both are largely driven by digital transformation
…and by C-suite, followed by ITOps
100% of the very successful and extremely successful implementations
use an AIOps platform. The top performers are consolidating to one.
The biggest surprise was not that AIOps is largely successful:
the surprise is how large that success is.
AI(work)Ops 2021 Top Findings
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5. High AIOps success rate and value relative to cost
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100% were successful with AIOps. 77% reported being very/extremely successful.
How would you characterize the value AIOps
brings to your organization relative to the cost?
Very high 21%
High 41%
Breakeven 17%
Too early to tell 16%
Early, but looks good 5%

6. AIOps: What’s in a name?
“What does the term AIOps mean to you?
Please select the answer that is closest to your
understanding.”
The use of AI or ML in IT operations 35%
The use of automation in IT operations 25%
The use of AI or ML plus automated actions 32%
An intelligent overlay or platform 8%
More than half of the respondents directly associated
automation with AIOps.
More than 50% of all respondents said that automation
is a C-suite initiative, strategic across the organization.
AIOps only rang in with a 32% strategic rating.
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7. Automation priority and AIOps strategic priority linked
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© 2021 Enterprise Management Associates, Inc.

8. Current state of automation
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9. Long-term automation goals
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10. Automations supported by AIOps implementations
Little difference between groups on
types of automation
High-performing groups select more
automations, and at a higher rate
Automation breeds automation
Automation increases with
implementation experience
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11. Top use cases in AIOps implementations and adjacent stakeholders
Adjacent stakeholders:
 IoT/OT business initiatives beyond IT
 DevOps
 Development directly
 Network operations
 Cloud migration and operations
 ITOM
 ITSM/ESM
 BizOps (business)
 SecOps
 SAM and ITAM
 APM
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12. Observability is a definite point of enterprise interest not just a marketing word
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13. Observability capabilities are not yet widespread
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Note: interestingly, companies that have an SRE function answered this question “worse” than others –
probably because they have a more informed view of what they don’t know.
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14. Which of the following capabilities are most important in your AIOps
implementation?
Analytical capabilities are increasingly paired with
automated actions and are trending in the
direction of predictive and prescriptive analytics.
The leading analytical capabilities today are, in
order:
 Machine learning (ML) to baseline and
recognize event patterns 48%
 Optimization algorithms to determine the best
use of IT and financial resources 45%
 Topology-based analytics to map relationships
and dependencies 41%
 Predictive algorithms that can identify potential
issues before they occur 41%
 Comparators that understand similarities and
differences 40%
 Observability that can detect unplanned
patterns and properties 35%
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15. Digital transformation and AIOps are tightly linked
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16. Characteristics and
Results of Highly
Successful AIOps
Implementations

17. AIOps as a strategic initiative and success levels correlate,
but tactical focus can also be high impact
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“How are digital transformation initiatives and AIOps
related in your organization?”
65% of the extremely successful group responded that
digital transformation drives their organization’s AIOps
strategy compared to only 15% of the successful group.

18. Top drivers of AIOps
Top drivers tend to be positive, even visionary:
 They speak to an organization’s focus on improvement
through innovation, as with DevSecOps
innovation/speed and support for the nascent SRE
function.
 Automation is broadly implied in operational
efficiencies, observability, and efficient
workflows/collaboration, as well as directly called out as
a natural point of progression for AIOps.
 A strategic, enterprise-level interest and C-level support
is represented in CIO priority and digital transformation
with an eye toward improved business outcomes.
Less successful groups tend to major in the immediate and
tactical rather than the strategic. Digital transformation is a
notable exception to this generalization, with all groups
ranking it as a top driver.
Cost came in at 9% for extremely successful group vs.
32% successful
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19. Metrics that measure AIOps success
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20. No shortage of challenges to AIOps
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21. The pain/gain ratio …. the pain
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22. Gain …outstanding results accompany AIOps success
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23. IT Benefits of AIOps
Strong DevOps/AIOps connection throughout survey
Increasingly SRE and security/ops connection
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24. Business benefits
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25. Organizational and process changes fostered by AIOps
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26. AIOps Platform Use
and Considerations

27. Platform use is an AIOps essential; platform consolidation as success indicator
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“Is there currently any effort to consolidate
or reduce the number of toolsets?”
• 61% said, “yes”
• 24% said, “no”
• 15% answered “No, but there should be”
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28. The platform market is active
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Sample Size = 190
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29. Who is looking for a new AIOps platform?
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30. Top 3 reasons for seeking new AIOps platform (by AIOps maturity)
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31. AIOps budget and buying
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PoCs:
• 35% took 7-12 months
• 30% took longer than one year
Who drives the investment?
AIOps:
Executives 49%
ITOps 27%
COE and technical 16%
Other 8%
Automation:
Executives 53%
ITOps 19%
COE and technical 17%
Other 10%
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32. The impact of AIOps on the relationship between IT and the business
"The impact of AIOps on the relationship between IT and the rest of the business has been … "
The impact of AIOps on the
relationship between IT
and the business is very
positive for 86% of
respondents.
Offered three positive
answers to choose from,
an impressive 21% chose
the superlative
“transformational.”
49% of those who self-rated
as extremely successful in
AIOps cited the impact as
transformational.
One reason is that AIOps
tends to align IT and
business, plus improved IT
service quality is always a
hit.
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33.  AIOps is ...
Real.
Early.
The near and clear future of ITOps.
Paved by aggressive vendor roadmaps.
Get the report: https://bit.ly/37VHQcf
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