Predictions from Zayo, Digital Infrastructure, and Mission Vital Group about what to anticipate from AI infrastructure in 2026
As AI workloads scale and infrastructure cycles compress, the strain on networks, energy techniques, and bodily deployment fashions is intensifying. By 2026, business leaders count on aggressive benefit to hinge much less on uncooked compute and extra on how intelligently infrastructure may be designed, related, secured, and developed.
Executives from Zayo, Digital Infrastructure, and Mission Vital Group define how AI-driven safety, network-centric architectures, long-haul fiber consolidation, energy system adaptability, and regulatory and labor constraints will form the following section of AI infrastructure. RCR has compiled their predictions beneath.
Shawn Edwards, chief safety officer, Zayo:
By 2026, the resilience of a community can be outlined by how intelligently it will probably defend itself
“Conventional, static community architectures merely can’t maintain tempo with AI-accelerated threats that mutate, transfer laterally, and probe infrastructure sooner than human operators can reply. The benefit shifts to networks that may sense and interpret irregular patterns in actual time, robotically modify routing, prioritize clear paths, and quarantine hostile visitors earlier than it impacts companies. As adversaries lean into autonomous AI to find weaknesses at scale, the one viable protection can be networks that use AI to repeatedly be taught, adapt, and harden themselves. The fashionable community received’t simply transfer packets; it’ll detect, predict, and reply at machine velocity.”
Jason ‘JJ’ Jorgensen, senior vice chairman of community implementation, Zayo
Regardless of insatiable bandwidth demand, the long-haul ecosystem will begin to slender — for the higher.
“The surge of recent capital into long-haul fiber will spark innovation and much-needed enlargement, however not each entrant can be outfitted for the operational realities of large-scale builds. The gauntlet of permits, jurisdictions, vendor chains, and environmental components can derail a mission that already prices upwards of tens of thousands and thousands of {dollars}, leaving some builders within the crimson and delaying essential progress. Over the following two years, we’ll see the market self-correct as expertise and execution rise to the highest. On the identical time, the sheer tempo and scope of development will power deeper aggregation throughout the ecosystem to speed up supply at scale. This pure shaking-out of the market will create a extra disciplined ecosystem able to constructing on the scale, velocity, and high quality AI requires.”
James Tomko, senior vice chairman, Digital Infrastructure
The AI infrastructure stack flips
“By 2026, the community will outline AI efficiency. AI coaching, inference, and knowledge motion will stretch throughout areas and regulatory boundaries, and the true limiter received’t be GPUs however interconnects throughout all the AI ecosystem. As distributed AI materials emerge, success will rely upon how intelligently knowledge strikes between compute nodes, not simply how briskly it’s processed inside them. As such, the community will change into the management airplane of AI.”
By 2026, the aggressive edge in AI received’t come from compute density alone, however from community design
“As AI workloads scale throughout distributed knowledge facilities, the flexibility to maneuver, synchronize, and handle knowledge effectively will matter as a lot as uncooked compute. Metro-scale and long-haul fiber will outline the winners of distributed AI — those that can interconnect and orchestrate knowledge throughout areas, clouds, and edges. The subsequent wave of AI management received’t be received within the knowledge middle alone, however throughout the networks that join them.”
Jeff Drees, CEO, Mission Vital Group
Electrification and GPUs will reshape the design cycle, forcing steady evolution
“Organizations constructing or integrating energy techniques inside industries present process electrification — resembling knowledge facilities, automotive, manufacturing, and healthcare — should understand that right this moment’s designs can be out of date inside two to a few years. Speedy adjustments in GPU and CPU expertise, in addition to evolving cooling approaches, are reshaping energy and electrical architectures at unprecedented velocity. The outdated mannequin of over-engineering with a buffer is disappearing; new websites should be constructed for quick high-density efficiency with minimal slack.
Consequently, engineering organizations will embrace modular blocks, upgradeable parts, manufacturing facility testing, and use scenario-based planning to arrange for future density will increase. Designs will shift from static, single-lifecycle tasks to versatile techniques constructed for repeat refreshes throughout a 20- to 30-year constructing lifespan. Iteration will change into a day by day actuality as new compute necessities ripple by way of cable sizing, voltage technique, and energy supply pathways. In 2026, adaptive engineering practices would be the solely viable response to a world the place infrastructure should evolve as quick because the expertise it helps.”
Matt Coffel, chief business and innovation officer, Mission Vital Group
Regulatory and allowing friction will sluggish the race to construct AI infrastructure
“Regulation and allowing will stay a defining constraint on knowledge middle enlargement in america all through the approaching 12 months and past. As operators and expertise firms race to scale capability amid accelerating AI demand, they are going to proceed to confront challenges with securing approvals from native governments and state companies, not just for constructing permits but in addition for environmental impacts, emissions, and noise.
And, as a result of laws and allowing necessities fluctuate broadly by jurisdiction — the place the method can differ dramatically inside main cities versus simply outdoors metropolis limits or in additional rural areas — companies should be taught to navigate a maze of guidelines that introduce complexity, uncertainty, and potential delays to their tasks. Consequently, knowledge middle operators will more and more search companions who perceive native regulatory landscapes and may ship options tailor-made to the precise necessities of the communities the place they plan to construct.”
Expert labor shortages will change into a essential threat within the knowledge middle provide chain
“With the rising improvement of information facilities — and the essential energy infrastructure required to assist them — there’s an ever-increasing demand for expert labor resembling electricians, welders, HVAC technicians, and even plumbers. Nonetheless, studies point out {that a} hole between accessible expertise and open jobs will develop, growing dangers for knowledge middle operators. This demand for expert staff will push organizations, governments, and academic establishments to speed up efforts to coach the following technology for these roles. Extra particularly, we’ll see deeper collaboration between employers and close by academic establishments — significantly these situated close to power-infrastructure manufacturing hubs, knowledge middle construct websites, and comparable industrial corridors — to create applications tailor-made to the technical necessities of those jobs and set up clear, path-to-career pipelines for college kids upon commencement. We’ll additionally see knowledge middle operators and power-supply companions lean extra closely on full, pre-tested energy modules that simplify set up and assist offset the rising pressure on specialised labor.”