BUSINESS TECH | Philippine businesses prioritize AI-ready infrastructure amid data security concerns
The findings were presented at the Synology Annual Media Event 2026 in Makati on Sept. 30, as the company outlined the infrastructure, cybersecurity and data-management challenges facing organizations.
More than 90% of Philippine businesses surveyed by Synology recognize the importance of AI-ready infrastructure to workflow efficiency and productivity, while data security and privacy remain the leading barriers to wider AI adoption.
The findings were presented at the Synology Annual Media Event 2026 in Makati on Sept. 30, as the company outlined the infrastructure, cybersecurity and data-management challenges facing organizations as they expand their use of artificial intelligence.
The survey found that 63% of Philippine respondents consider AI-ready infrastructure very important, while 74.1% prioritize on-premises or hybrid infrastructure over purely public cloud deployments. Synology said the preference reflects businesses’ demand for greater control and flexibility over their data and infrastructure as AI workloads become more critical.
For Antoine Yang, head of Southeast Asia at Synology, the growing use of AI makes the underlying data environment increasingly important.
“So, every business still need to define their boundaries, like where their data belongs to use the AI where it makes sense, and while keeping control of their data,” Yang said during the event.
Yang said businesses starting their AI journey face practical problems involving data that is distributed across different systems and formats. Documents, videos, communications and other information may be stored in separate environments, making it difficult for AI systems to access the complete information needed to produce reliable results.
“The first challenge is their data spread across everywhere, or we will call it data silos,” Yang said. He added that AI needs “the right information from every source to give the precise answer.”
The survey found that 47% of respondents identified data quality and availability as challenges, while 40% said their data is scattered across different environments. Nearly 40% also reported lacking visibility into how information submitted to third-party AI tools is managed.
Security, recovery remain concerns
The survey also points to a significant gap in cyber resilience as organizations become more dependent on AI and increasingly connected infrastructure.
Synology’s findings show that 85% of Philippine businesses are not fully prepared for AI-driven cyber threats, while only 14% consider themselves prepared to defend against and recover from such threats. Three in four respondents are also not fully confident that they can quickly recover with their backups intact following a cyberattack.
Claire Huang, country manager of Synology for the Philippines, said the issue goes beyond simply having backup systems.
“Having data backup is important, but you also need to ensure that the backup remains available, protected, and recoverable when you actually need it,” Huang said.
The survey separately found that 72.4% of respondents expressed confidence in their ability to recover from ransomware using protected backups, but only 25.4% described themselves as very confident.
Huang said businesses also need to address fragmentation, with nearly four in five organizations operating without a unified cybersecurity and data-protection platform. Separate tools for cloud workloads, virtual machines, physical servers and endpoints can create inconsistent protection and recovery processes.
AI adoption brings governance challenges
Beyond infrastructure and cybersecurity, the survey examined how AI is being incorporated into everyday work.
Around 69% of employees spend between two and more than 10 hours on manual document-related tasks, including preparing documents and presentations, working with spreadsheets, finding information and translation. Synology said these activities represent areas where AI could reduce repetitive work and improve productivity.
However, data security and privacy ranked as the biggest AI adoption challenge among Philippine businesses, followed by data quality and availability and scattered data.
AI governance is another concern. Only about 40% of businesses said they are fully confident they could produce a complete record of their AI activity, while more than 60% do not actively enforce technical controls over employee use of AI tools.
“The challenge is not simply whether businesses should use AI, it’s how to adopt AI while keeping corporate data secure, ensuring data is reliable, accessible, and bringing scattered data together so you can actually deliver value,” Huang said.
Synology’s response centers on three areas: scalable data infrastructure, cyber resilience and AI-powered productivity while retaining greater control over business data. Its 2026 portfolio includes the PAS7700 all-flash storage platform, refreshed FS and RS series, data reduction and tiering technologies, and Active Protect for backup and recovery.
Huang said the broader objective is to make AI adoption practical rather than simply increase the amount of AI deployed.
“Businesses should identify where AI can create the real value, maintain control and over the data behind it, and scale investment according to actual requirements,” she said. “The best AI strategy is not necessarily the most complex one, but the one that remains practical, manageable, and sustainable for your business.”
For Synology, the shift toward AI therefore puts greater emphasis on the infrastructure underneath the applications. Yang said businesses need data that can be trusted, found and protected as AI becomes increasingly integrated into operations.
“Like to use the AI well, business need the information they can trusted, they can find it, and they can protect it,” Yang said.
Full disclosure: All news articles published on the TechSabado website are written by human journalists, unless otherwise specified. Final text editing is also performed by human editors, with artificial intelligence (AI) used only to assist with additional grammar and style guide corrections..
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