Is data the engine or the obstacle for AI?

Many organizations recognize the potential of AI and data but struggle to turn it into real business value. Most are still at the early stages of their AI and data journey - dealing with fragmented systems, inaccessible legacy data, and limited data quality and governance. Without a strong data foundation, AI initiatives often stall before they scale. The numbers speak for themselves, as the studies suggest: 

• For 68% of organizations, data silos remain a top obstacle to seamless data management¹
• 71% percent of consumers expect personalized interactions²
• 84% percent of organizations have already started data modernization initiatives³
• 80% of industrial data is never used⁴
• 34% percent of CCOs reported that “new regulatory requirements” are the greatest compliance challenge⁵

Organizations need to break down silos, modernize infrastructure, and embrace secure data sharing to turn data into an engine for growth and innovation.

T-Systems unites AI and data into a single, secure, and sovereign ecosystem that delivers measurable business impact. With expertise in data spaces, Gaia-X, and Catena-X, we simplify complexity, ensure compliance, and help organizations harness the full potential of their data for digital transformation. We provide end-to-end solutions that enable organizations to extract maximum value from AI and data investments:

• AI and Data Consulting: Strategic guidance to integrate AI and data into business processes, governance, and decision-making, ensuring sustainable, measurable outcomes
• AI Foundation Services: Enhance productivity, optimize workflows, and improve employee and customer experiences through AI-powered capabilities, now enhanced with agentic AI and multi-agents. Learn more about AI Foundation Services
• Data Foundation Services: Comprehensive data management services to unlock data value, ensure compliance, and enable secure, trusted exchange via dataspaces
• Platform Foundation Services: Sovereign infrastructure and operational services providing security, resilience, and full control over IT landscapes
• AI and Data Experience Hub and Products: Monetize data assets, build scalable AI-driven applications, automate processes, and increase operational efficiency using standardized industry frameworks
• Operate and Maintain: Scale, deploy, and operate AI and data solutions securely on sovereign European infrastructure, with full control over your data and applications
• Data Analytics: Turn data into strategic intelligence, enabling faster decisions, proactive risk management, and enterprise-wide productivity gains

T-Systems enables organizations to harness sovereign, secure, and responsible AI and data for sustainable growth. Built on trust, quality, and European innovation, our solutions give businesses control over their data, support independent decision-making, and drive measurable progress.
Business value of sovereign AI and trusted data: 

• Productivity and efficiency: Automate knowledge access, streamline processes, and scale operations while reducing costs
• Growth and service quality: Accelerate innovation, enhance customer experience, and unlock new revenue opportunities
• Trust and compliance: EU-compliant by design, with full data sovereignty, security-first architecture, and vendor neutrality
• Innovation at scale: Future-ready AI stack with flexibility to grow sustainably across the enterprise
• People and capability: Empower employees, upskill teams, and drive smooth AI adoption with co-innovation
• Data exchange and monetization: Enable secure, sovereign data sharing and unlock new revenue streams by turning data into products, collaborating in trusted ecosystems, and monetizing insights

Our mission is to help organizations not just use AI, but continuously improve it, delivering trustworthy, scalable, and high-impact solutions that drive productivity, innovation, and real business outcomes.

¹ Data strategy trends in 2025: From silos to unified enterprise value, by Michelle Knight, December 3, 2024, Dataversity

² The value of getting personalization right—or wrong—is multiplying, by Nidhi Arora, Daniel Ensslen, Lars Fiedler, Wei Wei Liu, Kelsey Robinson, Eli Stein, and Gustavo Schüler, November 12, 2021, McKinsey & Company

³ Stepping up to a new level of compliance KPMG Global Chief Ethics and Compliance Officer survey, by Annabel Reoch, 2024, KPMG

⁴ Data Act: Commission proposes measures for a fair and innovative data economy, Press release, February 23, 2022, European Commission

⁵ Data modernization and the cloud, by Thomas H. Davenport and Ashish Verma, August 26, 2019, Deloitte