EY Identifies 10 Critical Opportunities as Tech Enters ‘Hyper-Velocity AI Moment’

In the spring of 2023, a technology executive could reasonably expect their AI strategy to remain relevant for twelve months. By 2025, that timeline had compressed to quarters. Now, according to a comprehensive new analysis from Ernst & Young, the window has narrowed further—to the point where velocity itself has become the primary competitive advantage.

EY’s annual “Top 10 Opportunities for Technology Companies in 2026” report, released this week, frames the current moment not merely as rapid change but as something more profound: a “hyper-velocity AI moment” that is actively redefining how companies create and capture value.

“Technology companies in Southeast Asia face a more complex landscape: uneven digital readiness, fragmented regulations, infrastructure gaps, as well as limited access to AI capabilities and talent. In 2026, success will go to those who can navigate these constraints while deploying AI and other innovations effectively and securely.” — Joongshik Wang, EY Asean Technology Leader

The New Playbook: From Experimentation to Operationalization

The report’s central argument is that 2026 marks a transition point. The era of AI experimentation—proof-of-concepts and pilot programs—is ending. What’s replacing it is something more demanding: the operationalization of AI-native strategies that must be safe, reliable, and commercially viable at scale.

Agentic interoperability emerges as a key theme. EY argues that companies must now design for an ecosystem where AI agents interact not just with humans but with each other, and increasingly with physical systems. The report points to “physical AI at the edge” as a critical frontier, suggesting that the competitive battleground is shifting from cloud-based models to distributed, autonomous systems.

Model selection flexibility receives equal emphasis. The monolithic approach—betting everything on a single provider or model—is increasingly untenable. Instead, EY recommends architectures that allow rapid switching between models based on performance, cost, and capability requirements.

“Velocity will be the defining factor of success in 2026. Organizations that move fast—without sacrificing interoperability or governance—will be better positioned to seize winner-take-most scenarios.” — EY Technology Industry Analysis

New Roles for a New Era

The report identifies emerging job categories that barely existed two years ago. “Forward deployed engineers”—technical specialists embedded directly with clients to navigate platform complexity—are becoming essential. So are AI FinOps specialists who can translate technical metrics into financial ROI, making finance teams the engine of AI value realization rather than mere cost centers.

This reflects a broader shift in how companies measure AI success. The vanity metrics of early AI adoption—number of models deployed, processing capacity, headcount in AI teams—are giving way to harder questions: What’s the actual return? How do we attribute revenue or cost savings to specific AI investments? How do we manage the financial complexity of usage-based pricing models?

EY’s recommendation is institutionalizing AI FinOps—not as a one-time analysis but as an ongoing function that continuously optimizes spending across models, infrastructure, and talent.

Sovereignty and Security in an Age of Borders

The report dedicates significant attention to what EY calls “sovereignty by default.” In a landscape of fragmented regulations and geopolitical tension, companies can no longer assume a single global architecture. Instead, they must design systems that can accommodate data localization requirements, cross-border restrictions, and varying regulatory regimes without sacrificing functionality.

Security, too, is reframed. The traditional perimeter-based model is inadequate when AI systems interact with external data, third-party models, and potentially hostile inputs. EY identifies “redefining enterprise security for AI, identity and nation-state threats” as one of the top 10 opportunities—a recognition that the attack surface has fundamentally changed.

The M&A Imperative

Perhaps most striking is EY’s emphasis on mergers, acquisitions, and joint ventures. In a hyper-velocity environment, building everything in-house is increasingly impractical. The report recommends “opportunistic transactions” and “JV ecosystem plays” as primary growth mechanisms, suggesting that the winners of 2026 will be defined as much by their deal-making acumen as by their engineering capabilities.

This creates a paradox: companies must move fast, but they must also integrate acquired capabilities quickly enough to realize value before the technology landscape shifts again. The organizations that master this integration challenge—absorbing new teams, technologies, and cultures without losing velocity—will pull ahead of those that accumulate assets without the ability to deploy them effectively.

The report’s conclusion is both optimistic and demanding. The opportunities are substantial, but capturing them requires a level of organizational agility that few companies have achieved. In 2026, the gap between leaders and laggards won’t be measured in quarters—it will be measured in the ability to operate at hyper-velocity while maintaining the governance and reliability that enterprise customers demand.

This article was reported by the ArtificialDaily editorial team. For more information, visit EY.