What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas. At least that’s what they say. But when the brightest minds in compute, networking, energy, and AI come together at the MGM Grand to debate what the next decade of digital infrastructure might look like, it’s difficult to keep a lid on things, particularly when the UNLV Marching Band opens on the main stage.
Yotta 2025 wasn’t your typical calendar event. More than 3,000 leaders and experts gathered, with six content tracks, an expanded expo floor, and even a ‘Shark Tank’ style pitch competition for startups. In true Vegas style, serious discussions were tempered with high-energy entertainment: DJ sets that ran late into the night, Raves at the MGM Pool, and Happy Hours to keep the conversations flowing.
But in between the Galactic Drummers and Las Vegas Raiders cheerleaders, we decided to have a little fun of our own. In a wholly unscientific study, we ran a pulse-poll amongst the attendees in the hallways of Yotta. DE-CIX works with some of America’s largest enterprises, and many of them attended Yotta along with the great and good from hyperscalers, data centers, and IT and hardware providers. It may not have been a precisely coordinated survey, but we did manage to gather more than 200 opinions and capture a fascinating snapshot of how industry insiders see the Internet, the cloud, and even outer space evolving by 2030.
Our questions, gratefully received I’m sure, covered all sorts of things – whether or not enterprises will continue to trust the public Internet, why latency might become the new price point for connectivity, and even the possibility of putting the first ever Internet Exchange into orbit. The answers tell a story that’s equal parts optimism and skepticism, but they do mirror many of the trends we’re already seeing with networks and enterprises worldwide.
The End of trust in public Internet?
One of the most provocative poll results was the question of whether the public Internet will still be trusted for enterprise traffic by 2030. Nearly half of those we asked (or accosted?) said no, they expect enterprises to move away from relying on it. Curiously, that’s almost a majority. From my perspective, it reflects a reality we are already seeing: Enterprises want more security, more resilience, and more predictability than the public Internet can consistently offer. This doesn’t mean the Internet is going away, but it does mean that the best-effort model of connectivity is no longer sufficient for critical workloads. Secure interconnection, direct cloud access, and private connectivity are becoming the default for enterprises that cannot afford downtime or data breaches. And while 34% of those we asked still defended the role of the public Internet, the direction of travel is clear. Blind trust is being replaced by the need for control and security.
The cloud gets… complicated
Another finding that stood out was the prediction that by 2026, enterprises will abandon single-cloud strategies. Nearly half of those we spoke to agreed with this statement, reflecting the growing recognition that putting all your eggs in one basket is a risky approach in today’s environment. We already see enterprises diversifying their cloud strategies to balance cost, resilience, and performance, and this trend is only accelerating. Multi-cloud and hybrid deployments give organizations the flexibility to pick the right provider for each workload, while reducing the risk of being locked into a single vendor’s ecosystem. From an interconnection perspective, this creates a new status quo – enterprises need reliable, neutral platforms that let them connect seamlessly to multiple clouds and edge resources at once. Complexity is increasing, but with the right connectivity architecture, it can be turned into a source of strength rather than vulnerability.
Will space provide the new Internet backbone?
By 2030, satellite Internet will be as common as fiber broadband. That’s what 65% of our sample believed. Another 60% even foresee the first Internet Exchange operating in orbit within the next decade. Science fiction? Or the next practical step in the evolution of global connectivity?
Satellites are no longer seen as mere “coverage amplifiers” to deliver basic Internet to remote places. They’re being reimagined as high-performance extensions of the terrestrial backbone. With projects like the European Space Agency’s OFELIAS initiative, which is exploring the use of lasers instead of radio waves to deliver fiber-like speeds from orbit, we’re already witnessing satellite technology shift from a story of coverage to one of capacity and performance. This is part of the motivation behind DE-CIX’s recently announced plans of putting Internet Exchanges in orbit, as part of a program called Space-IX. The idea of interconnection hubs beyond Earth’s atmosphere – streamlining connectivity between satellites and the Earth – might raise eyebrows, but it underlines what we already know: The digital economy is global, connected applications are multiplying, and there are only so many places you can lay cables.
Latency will be the new currency
Somewhat related to the idea of optical space lasers is latency. As real-time AI inference continues to embed itself in every corner of industry, latency has become the make-or-break factor. More than 60% of those we asked agreed that by 2030, pricing will be based on latency rather than bandwidth. This is a huge shift from where we were even just a decade ago, where bandwidth reigned supreme. Today’s users and businesses are less concerned with how much data can be moved, and far more concerned with how fast it can get to where it needs to be. As AI workloads, autonomous vehicles, robotics, and real-time healthcare applications continue to emerge, the tolerance for round-trip delay is shrinking to milliseconds or less. Latency has become the new currency of digital performance, and enterprises increasingly recognize that their competitiveness depends on shaving every possible millisecond off transmission times. From my vantage point, this shift is already underway. Networks and interconnection platforms are being re-architected with latency in mind, and the business models of connectivity will inevitably follow suit.
Our very scientific takeaway
Like the marching bands, DJs, and cosmic pool parties, our little hallway poll was all part of the fun at Yotta 2025. But despite our rather slapdash approach, the answers point to something real: enterprises are bracing for a world where trust in the public Internet erodes, single-cloud strategies fade, satellites become mainstream, and latency takes center stage. Whether or not the first Internet Exchange in orbit will be built within the decade is yet to be seen, but one thing is certain – the conversations happening at events like Yotta show just how quickly our assumptions about connectivity are changing. In fact, our little poll may prove the exception to the rule: what happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.