Managed service providers (MSPs) should take note: as the volume of code created using artificial intelligence (AI) coding tools continues to grow, so does the number of incidents that may require their attention.
A survey of 406 IT decision-makers at organizations with more than 250 employees in North America found that 93 percent have experienced at least one infrastructure incident caused by reliance on AI tools.
AI is increasing pressure on infrastructure teams
Panterra Group conducted the survey on behalf of Spacelift, a provider of an infrastructure-as-code (IaC) automation platform. The survey found that 86 percent of respondents said AI has increased demands on infrastructure teams. Common challenges include security vulnerabilities appearing faster (40 percent), governance becoming more difficult (40 percent), increasing change rates (37 percent), greater strain on pipelines (35 percent), and growing infrastructure drift (35 percent).
More code, more opportunities for incidents
It’s not clear whether code generated using AI coding tools is inherently better or worse than code written by humans. One thing is certain: as organizations generate more code, they create more opportunities for issues to arise. Teams also need to identify and remediate vulnerabilities more quickly. For example, MSPs may need to address threats such as AI-driven zero-day vulnerabilities more frequently.
Most MSPs staff their incident management teams based on historical incident volumes. That metric may no longer reflect reality. As organizations deploy and update more software, they increase the likelihood of encountering issues.
The automation gap MSPs must close
In theory, AI tools and platforms should automatically resolve more of these issues. In practice, many MSPs have not adopted AI as quickly as organizations develop and deploy software. As a result, many MSP help desks risk becoming overwhelmed by the growing number of incidents they must manage.
Hopefully, this gap is temporary. Most MSPs simply cannot afford to hire enough IT professionals to handle a growing volume of incidents. The challenge—and opportunity—is to invest in AI across IT workflows. The ultimate goal is to prevent incidents before they occur. After all, as most MSPs know, the best IT incident is the one that never happens.
An AI arms race for service delivery
MSPs, like it or not, are now locked in an AI arms race. Clients will increasingly choose providers that can reduce incident volumes and shorten mean time to resolution (MTTR). Soon, organizations may measure MTTR in minutes or seconds rather than hours—or even weeks.
In the meantime, MSPs should prepare now for what could become the most challenging era of incident management yet.
Photo: Andrii Yalanskyi / Shutterstock
