Cloudera to Detail Production AI Push at EVOLVE26

At last year’s EVOLVE25, Cloudera positioned itself as a platform for hybrid workloads with an “AI anywhere” approach spanning the edge, on-premises infrastructure and the cloud. The company is now trying to make good on that promise as enterprises move agentic workflows into production, according to Paul Nashawaty, principal analyst for theCUBE Research.

“Last year, the narrative was about establishing a hybrid, ‘AI anywhere’ foundation,” he said. “This year, expect the conversation to pivot to the operationalization of that vision. The focus has moved from abstract potential to the mechanics of running production-grade AI at scale, proving that enterprise data architectures can handle the rigors of agentic workflows.”

The event follows Cloudera’s August launch of the Cloudera Anywhere Cloud platform, which is designed to support the deployment and management of AI applications across public clouds and on-premises environments. The platform also provides a way for organizations to bring AI capabilities to proprietary data without moving sensitive information between systems.

“Cloudera Anywhere Cloud reflects a strategic maturity toward ‘AI everywhere,’ moving from just having access to data to having the capability to deploy agents where the data lives,” Nashawaty said. “It highlights an architectural shift where the compute moves to the data, rather than the alternative, which is critical for reducing latency and maintaining governance in distributed enterprise settings.”

That shift addresses a practical obstacle for enterprises: AI agents need access to business data, but moving that information between environments can introduce security risks, compliance concerns and additional costs. Cloudera Anywhere Cloud is designed to give organizations greater control over where AI workloads run while supporting applications on existing infrastructure and maintaining consistent governance across distributed environments.

“Organizations shouldn’t have to choose between innovation and control,” said Cloudera Chief Product Officer Leo Brunnick. “Cloudera Anywhere Cloud brings the speed and flexibility of the cloud directly to enterprise data, allowing customers to accelerate AI initiatives while maintaining complete ownership of it, with optimized cost of infrastructure and tokens.”

Data sovereignty is another part of Cloudera’s hybrid AI strategy. For enterprises operating across national borders or in regulated industries, the ability to use proprietary information without transferring it to external AI services can influence which models and platforms they adopt. Cloudera is positioning its governed data architecture as a foundation for those deployments, allowing organizations to manage AI workloads while retaining control over sensitive information. In September, Cloudera announced a partnership with French AI company Mistral, adding another component to the sovereign AI effort.

“Cloudera’s competitive edge is its ability to bridge the gap between data-at-rest and data-in-motion,” Nashawaty said. “While other cloud infrastructure providers offer raw compute, Cloudera is distinguishing itself by providing an open, governed data layer that remains consistent across hybrid environments. It isn’t just about storage; it’s about providing the trusted data foundation that AI applications require to be performant and compliant.”

Ahead of EVOLVE26, the question is how effectively that approach can support production AI at scale. Beyond deploying agents, enterprises must account for workload performance, infrastructure costs and the controls needed to manage autonomous systems across distributed environments.