Data in Motion: The Key to Turning AI Hype into a Strategic Enterprise Advantage – CXOToday.com
The outlook for digital transformation appears bleak, and there’s no indication it’s improving. While 90% of C-level leaders surveyed by McKinsey say their companies have undergone a digital transformation in the last two years, the risk of failure falls as high as 95%, according to Bain & Company. For most organizations, becoming truly data-driven remains an aspiration rather than a reality. Meanwhile, the rise of agentic AI has created fresh excitement—and fresh confusion. While AI tools offer the promise of automation, prediction, and optimization, they can’t fix the root cause behind stalled digital and AI initiatives: fragmented, siloed data.
The Nasscom AI Adoption Index report suggests that 44% of the Indian enterprises either have inadequate data or siloed data, which is limiting them from scaling AI solutions. India’s ambitions—from becoming a $5 trillion economy to leading in AI innovation—rest heavily on getting enterprise data right. Enterprises that unify and activate their data will lead India’s next growth chapter. Those clinging to siloed, legacy systems will be left behind—one missed opportunity at a time.
AI is now at the heart of modern enterprise strategy, but it cannot succeed in isolation. AI is the brain—analyzing, learning, and making decisions. Digital transformation is the body—modernizing systems, workflows, and customer experiences. The lifeblood flowing between them? Unified, real-time data.
Without clean, connected, continuously updated data, AI can’t function—and digital transformation grinds to a halt. Organizations that understand and act on this relationship are setting themselves up for compounding returns on their transformation investments.
This is no longer a technical problem to be delegated to IT, the CDO, or the CIO. It’s a CEO-level imperative. Data must be treated as a strategic asset and managed as rigorously as capital, talent, or customer relationships. In the age of AI, enterprise leaders must take accountability for their data strategy—or risk being left behind.
Data silos remain the biggest barrier to transformation. In the average enterprise, data is spread across 800+ apps, with only 29% integrated, according to Salesforce. Customer information is often duplicated across billing, marketing, sales, and loyalty systems—creating errors, inefficiencies, and wasted potential.
To move forward, companies must treat customer data as a shared asset—not a departmental artifact. The path to AI-powered transformation begins with breaking down these silos and creating a unified data foundation accessible by all teams and systems. This effort must be championed from the top.
Legacy architectures were built for “data at rest”—static snapshots updated infrequently. But AI and modern digital business require data in motion: real-time, streaming, interoperable data that flows seamlessly across the enterprise.
This shift is strategic—and urgent.
Cloud-based data unification and management platforms help companies:
With canonical data models, cloud-native scalability, and API-first delivery, these platforms serve as the foundation of intelligent, automated, AI-driven businesses.
When data is interoperable, companies gain a 360-degree view of customers, suppliers, and products. This enables:
These aren’t future-state scenarios—they’re already delivering measurable business impact for enterprises that have unified their data.
Yet too often, these opportunities are missed because data decisions are siloed within IT. Data strategy must be elevated to the C-suite agenda. CEOs must own the vision, set the tone, and invest accordingly. Without this leadership, transformation efforts risk stalling again.
To become truly data-driven in the age of AI, organizations must do more than govern data. They must activate it—embedding intelligence and trust into every stream, pipeline, and process.
This means:
The payoff is massive. When data flows freely, AI performs better. Digital transformation accelerates. And the entire organization gains the agility to respond to change in milliseconds.
Legacy systems and siloed thinking belong to a slower era. In today’s fast-moving, AI-infused enterprise, real-time data is not a nice-to-have—it’s a strategic imperative.
Enterprises that unify their data, modernize their platforms, and unlock data in motion will lead. The rest will be outpaced—one silo, one stalled initiative, one missed opportunity at a time.
This is the moment for CEOs to lead from the front. Treat data as the business-critical resource it is. Because in the era of AI, the winners won’t just be digital—they’ll be data-fluent, fast-moving, and future-ready.
(The author is Manish Sood, CEO & Founder, Reltio, and the views expressed in this article are his own)
CXOtoday is a premier resource on the world of IT, relevant to key business decision makers. We offer IT perspective & news to the C-suite audience. We also provide business and technology news to those who evaluate, invest, and manage the IT infrastructure of organizations. CXOtoday has a well-networked and strong community that encourages discussions on what’s happening in the world of IT and its impact on businesses.
Copyright © 2025 Trivone. All Rights Reserved.
source
This is a newsfeed from leading technology publications. No additional editorial review has been performed before posting.
