New study reveals rising costs, cyber risk and complexity reshaping UK IT resilience strategies for 2027; 89% faced higher data centre infrastructure costs, with an average increase of 14%.
LONDON, UK - 12 November 2026 - 11:11 Systems, a leading managed infrastructure solutions provider, today announced UK findings from its 2027 State of IT Infrastructure Resilience study. The research finds that rising costs, expanding complexity and growing cyber risk are forcing UK organisations to rethink how they build, protect and recover critical infrastructure.
Nearly nine in ten UK respondents (89%) reported increased data centre infrastructure costs over the past 12 months. The average increase was 14%, while 15% of respondents reported increases of more than 25%. At the same time, 41% identified cyberattacks on production platforms as a leading data centre strategy concern, showing how infrastructure cost and cyber risk are increasingly part of the same strategic decision set.
The survey findings point to a defining challenge for the year ahead: infrastructure costs are now at the forefront, elevating cost management to a strategic priority. Rising costs join platform change, AI, cybersecurity and recovery demands in a convergence of pressures known as "The Great Infrastructure Reset," requiring UK IT leaders to make integrated, cross-functional decisions to address complexity across the entire infrastructure landscape.
Key UK findings include:
- Infrastructure costs are rising significantly. Eighty-nine per cent of UK respondents reported an increase in data centre infrastructure costs over the past 12 months.
- Cyber risk, infrastructure costs and complexity are converging. Among organisations operating across multiple hypervisors or hybrid-cloud environments, 49% cited operational complexity as a key challenge, 49% cited cost unpredictability and 48% identified skills shortages. These barriers sit alongside data centre strategy concerns: 41% cited cyberattacks on production platforms, 38% cited cyberattacks on identity platforms and 37% cited rising storage or memory costs.
- Cyberattacks remain common and disruptive. More than seven in ten UK organisations (73%) experienced at least one cyberattack or breach in the previous 12 months, while 21% experienced three or more incidents. Of the respondents, 39% experienced production-data encryption that made data unusable, while 33% experienced systems being brought down or damaged.
- Backup systems remain exposed during attacks. Sixty per cent of respondents said their backup systems were unaffected during an attack, but 40% reported that at least some backup repositories were affected. This exposure demonstrates why backup must form part of a broader cyber-resilience and recovery strategy.
- AI investment is outpacing readiness. Ninety-one per cent of UK respondents are investing in or evaluating AI for IT and security operations: 62% are actively investing in AI-enhanced IT or security tools, while 29% are evaluating AI tools but have not committed budget. However, only 20% said AI-enhanced backup or disaster-recovery capabilities were operational, highlighting a gap between interest and current deployment.
- Organisations are considering further resilience investment. Looking ahead to 2027, 43% of respondents said they would definitely consider new cyber-resilience, backup or disaster-recovery solutions, while 40% said they probably would. Together, 83% would definitely or probably consider such investment, indicating strong interest without implying that budget has been committed or a purchase decision made.
"This research quantifies what IT leaders are already feeling; the challenges are stacking up faster than the budgets," said Jason Buffington, principal analyst and founder of Data Protection Matters, which conducted the research. "Cyberattacks remain an ever-present threat, and now organizations have to govern their own AI while defending against the attackers' AI, all while rising hardware costs squeeze budgets that were already tight. For many organizations, the way through that storm is leaning on expertise as-a-service to reduce complexity, while modernizing how they protect and recover their data."
"Many IT leaders are reassessing their virtualization strategy as VMware licensing and commercial terms evolve, but the economics aren't one-size-fits-all. For some environments, VMware may remain the right choice once the full cost and complexity of switching are considered," said Justin Giardina, chief technology officer, 11:11 Systems. "The decision is about more than license price: teams also need to weigh migration effort, operational complexity, security and recovery requirements. The goal isn't to stay or switch by default, but to choose an infrastructure path that balances cost with security, recoverability and resilience as workloads evolve."
The report also examines the impact of multi-hypervisor environments, evolving backup and disaster recovery requirements, AI adoption strategies, infrastructure cost management and the operational realities of modern cyber resilience.
The study was commissioned by 11:11 Systems and conducted by Data Protection Matters (DPM), an independent analyst firm specialising in data protection, backup, cyber resilience, business continuity, disaster recovery and BaaS/DRaaS. The global survey included more than 700 IT leaders across seven countries, including 163 respondents from the UK. Respondents were directly involved in IT infrastructure, cybersecurity, backup or disaster recovery decision-making.
The full 2027 State of IT Infrastructure Resilience report is available from 11:11 Systems.
About 11:11 Systems
11:11 Systems is a managed infrastructure solutions provider that empowers customers to modernise, protect and manage mission-critical applications and data through 11:11 Systems' resilient cloud platform. Learn more at 11:11 Systems and?follow?11:11 on LinkedIn.
Media Contact
Destiny Gillbee
PR Director
C8 Consulting Ltd
11-11Systems@c8consulting.co.uk
