The rapid uptake of artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming a central driver of digital resilience while also increasing the complexity of IT systems and governance. A recent SUSE study shows that digital sovereignty is now treated as a strategic priority — 98% of surveyed companies consider it important — yet only 52% have taken concrete steps toward implementing it.
SUSE presented the research at its annual global conference, SUSECON, held in Prague from April 20 to 23. The survey polled 309 IT leaders across five countries and examined how organizations view digital sovereignty: specifically, their ability to keep control over data, IT operations and technology decisions.
Why the issue matters more now
The study highlights that AI both accelerates innovation and raises operational and business risks. Companies need to understand precisely what data their models rely on, how models are trained, and the environments in which workloads run. Lack of control is not only a technical problem — it can weaken customer trust and increase legal and compliance exposure.
Sixty-four percent of respondents said that AI transparency — clarity about model provenance, training and operation — will be the main driver of digital resilience over the next five years.
Current practice and drivers
Despite recognizing the importance of sovereignty, many organizations have not yet moved from intent to action: the issue is appearing in technology procurements (45% say it is included in requests for proposal) and 42% say they ultimately choose suppliers based on it. Still, 41% of firms only engage with the topic due to external pressure, such as customer or regulatory demands.
Other resilience priorities identified by respondents include:
- cybersecurity and threat detection (63%),
- diversification through multi-cloud or hybrid operations (52%),
- backup and recovery capabilities (45%),
- continuous monitoring (44%).
Control over service providers is also key: 65% view the large global cloud providers as major players in delivering solutions that support digital sovereignty. At the same time, there is growing interest in greater in-house control and in open, collaborative systems to reduce supplier dependence.
The role of open infrastructure
According to the SUSE research, open source solutions are considered very or critically important for digital resilience by 94% of respondents. SUSE experts argue that open infrastructure best meets current expectations by supporting innovation, regulatory compliance, resilience and data control simultaneously.
The study cites tools such as SUSE Linux Enterprise Server, SUSE Rancher Prime and SUSE AI as examples of solutions that can help organizations exercise greater control over data, models and IT environments while reducing vendor lock-in.
Conclusions
The SUSE survey suggests that digital sovereignty is rising in importance as AI spreads, but practical implementation lags behind strategic recognition. Organizations must balance speed of innovation, compliance requirements and control over data — and a clear majority of respondents see open infrastructure as a central means to achieve that balance.
