According to Forrester’s 2025 technology and security predictions, 75% of technology decision-makers will see their technical debt rise to a moderate or high level of severity by 2026. This will be due to the rapid development of AI solutions, which are adding complexity to IT landscapes. 

To stem the tsunami of technical debt, in 2025, tech leaders will triple the adoption of AI for IT operations (AIOps) platforms, which deliver contextually aware data to enhance human judgment, automatically remediate incidents, and improve business outcomes. While AIOps is the future, IT leaders aiming to run a high-performance IT organization will also need to invest in building the right culture, data, architecture, and security practices to accelerate business growth. 

Forrester’s technology and security predictions analyze the dynamics and emerging trends to watch for in the year ahead. These insights help leaders, and their teams prepare for future challenges and take advantage of new opportunities to thrive in 2025. Topics include: artificial intelligence; automation; tech leadership; cloud computing; tech infrastructure and operations; enterprise software; software development; and cybersecurity, risk, and privacy. 

Highlights from Forrester’s 2025 technology and security predictions include the following: 

• Private cloud will gain momentum with VMWare alternatives. In 2025, most major public cloud providers will increase investments in private cloud, but it’s unlikely that newcomers will increase business with dominant private cloud player VMware given recent bundling and pricing changes. 

• Most enterprises fixated on AI ROI will scale back prematurely. Leaders are realizing that ROI from AI investments will take longer than they anticipated. Impatience with AI ROI could prompt enterprises to prematurely scale back investments, which would be a long-term disadvantage. 

• The European Union will fine a generative AI provider for the first time under the EU AI Act. With the EU AI Office and data protection authorities joining forces, a general-purpose AI (GPAI) model’s provider will receive the first fine for violating the EU AI Act in 2025. As with the General Data Protection Regulation, the EU AI Act applies to entities that operate in the EU as well as those that supply AI systems or GPAI models to the EU, regardless of where they’re headquartered. 

“In 2024, technology and security leaders ran pilots across their enterprises to explore innovative applications of AI,” said Sharyn Leaver, chief research officer at Forrester, “but not all AI initiatives yielded the intended business outcomes. While this bold experimentation will continue in 2025, leaders will also focus heavily on putting the lessons learned into practice to ensure that their investments deliver true business value.”