A new Philippines-focused report from ST Telemedia Global Data Centres (STT GDC), titled “Mind the Gap: Bridging the AI Infrastructure Readiness Divide,” highlights strong AI adoption momentum in the country but persistent barriers in scaling deployments.
The study shows that 79% of Philippine organisations are already in the “Builder” stage of AI adoption, actively deploying early operational AI solutions.
However, maturity beyond this stage remains limited, with only 2% reaching the “Integrator” stage, 0% at “Leader” status, and 19% still in the “Explorer” phase, indicating a sharp drop-off in advanced implementation.
Infrastructure limitations are emerging as a critical constraint. 71% of respondents cite insufficient compute capacity, storage, or network bandwidth as the primary barrier to advancing AI initiatives.
The same share also reports that latency, bandwidth constraints, and network bottlenecks are already limiting performance, especially for more data-intensive and mission-critical AI workloads.
Talent shortages further slow progress. 76% of organisations report critical AI talent gaps, while 53% admit they lack in-house expertise to manage complex AI infrastructure and operations.
On the organisational side, 94% describe their culture as sceptical, cautious, or ambivalent toward AI, pointing to challenges beyond technology alone.
“The data shows a clear pattern — Philippine organisations are investing and experimenting with AI, but many are reaching an infrastructure and capability ceiling,” said Carlo Malana, President and CEO, STT GDC Philippines. “Compute, storage and connectivity constraints, combined with a shortage of specialised operational expertise, are making it difficult to move from pilots to reliable, scaled deployment. Addressing these challenges together is essential if organisations are to fully realise the value of AI.”
Looking ahead, the readiness gap is expected to widen. 46% of organisations expect AI workloads to grow by more than 50% over the next 1–3 years, but only 3% say they are currently ready to scale high-demand AI workloads.
At the same time, 86% are allocating just 5% or less of their IT budgets to AI, raising concerns about whether investment levels can keep pace with demand.
The report, Mind the Gap: Bridging the AI Infrastructure Readiness Divide, was commissioned by STT GDC and conducted by Ecosystm.
It surveyed enterprises and digital-native organisations across Asia, assessing AI maturity across strategy, organisational readiness, data governance, infrastructure, and future planning. The Philippines findings are based on 62 organisations across multiple industries.
The full report is available via STT GDC’s official site.
