As AI takes center stage in enterprise strategies, CIOs face a crucial challenge: how do we scale development without sacrificing security or control?
AI-powered tools like GitHub Copilot, Vercel, and Codeium are speeding up software delivery at an unprecedented rate. But with this speed comes a greater risk – hardcoded secrets, over-provisioned access, and fragmented infrastructure.
The solution? According to Sebastian Weiss, Regional Vice President DACH at HashiCorp, a secure, automated approach that manages infrastructure and identity throughout its lifecycle.
The Speed of AI Demands a Faster, More Secure Foundation
Cloud spending is expected to exceed $700 billion by 2025, driven largely by AI workloads. Developers are moving faster than ever, but the security foundations they rely on – identity, access, and infrastructure – often remain static.
Thousands of unmanaged secrets scattered across both cloud and on-prem environments expose enterprises to increasing risk. These credentials are a prime target for breaches, and the longer they go undetected, the more dangerous they become.
From ILM to SLM: Automating for Resilience and Innovation
Top CIOs are already evolving their strategies to cover the full lifecycle of both infrastructure and security. Infrastructure Lifecycle Management (ILM) automates the provisioning of infrastructure as code across cloud environments. Security Lifecycle Management (SLM) extends this automation to secrets and access, making security continuous, contextual, and enforced by default.
This model not only strengthens resilience, but it also enables faster innovation. Developers no longer have to wait for access; security teams can automate policies, and governance is integrated directly into workflows.
Regulatory Pressure: Resilience Is No Longer Optional
Regulations like DORA, NIS2, and CRITIS aren’t just suggesting better security – they’re requiring it. Governments and regulatory bodies demand IT infrastructure that is resilient, auditable, and disruption-proof. Without these foundational protections, AI adoption could be blocked. Static environments simply can’t scale securely, and manual oversight won’t meet the growing compliance demands.
HashiCorp’s Infrastructure Cloud is designed to tackle these challenges head-on, offering tools to automate access, unify secrets, and scale governance across your environment.
Enabling Secure Innovation
AI is transforming software development, but that transformation must rest on a foundation of secure, resilient infrastructure. A solid ILM + SLM framework ensures secrets are rotated, access is controlled, and services are protected – no matter how quickly the development cycle moves. For today’s CIOs, resilience isn’t just about defense. It’s the key to unlocking secure, scalable innovation.
