AI spiked cloud waste to 29%
New reporting shows wasted cloud spend climbed to about 29% as AI workloads surged, despite FinOps progress — meaning AI adds both governance and cost risks. That reinforces why cloud cost telemetry needs to be integrated into GRC controls for SOX and budget attestations. (itbrief.co.nz)
63% of organizations report they have established dedicated FinOps teams, and 64% say those teams now deliver measurable value to business units. (flexera.com) 71% of surveyed organizations operate a Cloud Center of Excellence (CCOE), signaling growing centralization of cloud governance and policy-setting. (flexera.com) 81% of respondents reported active use of generative AI services, up from 72% the prior year and 47% in 2024, illustrating rapid operationalization of AI workloads. (flexera.com) More than half (53%) of cloud leaders identified security and compliance as the top challenge for cloud-based AI initiatives, while 40% pointed to data quality for model training. (flexera.com) Large enterprises carry substantial monthly public-cloud bills, with 76% of large organizations spending more than $5 million per month, and estimated software waste reported at roughly 25% of public-cloud software spend. (blog.shi.com) The findings come from Flexera’s 15th annual State of the Cloud survey, which polled more than 750 cloud decision-makers and users worldwide during winter 2025. (flexera.com)
