As we enter 2026, five leading technology experts share their most critical predictions for the year ahead. From AI’s march toward measurable business value to the collapse of traditional AI stacks, these insights reveal where enterprises must focus to stay competitive—and secure.

Dan Priest, Chief AI Officer at PwC US, declares 2026 as the year AI value realization moves from experimentation to strategic scale. After initial implementations in 2025, organizations will finally see AI deliver measurable ROI at enterprise scale.

Anil Inamdar, Global Head of Data Services at NetApp Instaclustr, predicts a fundamental shift in the AI technology stack with three transformative trends: First, data infrastructure platforms like Cassandra, Postgres, Kafka, and OpenSearch will evolve from passive storage to active decision-makers, filtering relevance and shaping AI behavior before models even run. Second, real-time event streaming through Kafka-style architectures will create AI “nervous systems” where speed trumps intelligence—decisions happen as events occur, not after dashboards refresh. Third, open-source will become the only trusted AI substrate as enterprises, regulators, and security teams demand inspectability, explainability, and ownership over black-box solutions.

Sandy Kronenberg, CEO of Netarx, warns that deepfakes have evolved into a multimodal disinformation crisis spanning voice, video, images, text, and email. With 62% of organizations already encountering deepfake-based social engineering attacks, 2026 will see enterprises move from exploration to widespread deployment of disinformation defense platforms. Forward-looking organizations are establishing dedicated trust operations and appointing Chief Trust Officers. Gartner predicts 30% of enterprises will abandon facial recognition due to deepfake vulnerabilities, while new regulations will mandate clear labeling of AI-generated content.

Mikey Pruitt, Global Partner Evangelist at DNSFilter, sounds the alarm on DNS security: ICANN’s October rollout of a new cryptographic key for the DNS root zone will expose a critical vulnerability—only 4% of .com domains have DNSSEC enabled. The remaining 96% of commercial domains are essentially “running around with ‘hack me’ signs on their backs.” As the root hardens, attackers will move downstream, automating tools to exploit unsigned domains for cache poisoning, DNS hijacking, credential theft, and supply chain attacks. Pruitt argues DNSSEC will stop being optional in 2026, though it must be paired with protective DNS to actually block threats.

Mark Clayman, CEO of Netrio, predicts the MSP market will split into two groups: organizations that operationalize AI and excel, versus those that don’t and get left behind. He identifies three critical waves: Wave one sees AI-driven efficiency become table stakes—automating repetitive tickets, reporting, and admin work while accelerating prospect discovery and contract negotiation. Wave two transforms data into revenue as MSPs use AI to spot patterns, predict needs, and enable agentic AI for self-service and self-healing capabilities. Wave three introduces customer-facing AI that creates entirely new service offerings focused on clients’ business operations rather than just reactive support.

The common thread across all five predictions? 2026 is the year technology moves from experimentation to operationalization, from awareness to action, and from optional to essential. Organizations that act decisively on AI value realization, data infrastructure modernization, disinformation defense, DNS security, and service automation will define the competitive landscape for years to come.