In practice, it is almost never about replacing existing infrastructure in its entirety, but about using what you already have in a more deliberate and structured way.

First: get an overview of what is actually happening

The most important starting point is insight, not just into whether something works or not, but into how the network actually behaves day to day.

That means understanding how users connect, how applications respond, and where friction actually arises in the user experience.

In many environments, this information already exists, but it is fragmented and difficult to use in practice.

When you bring it together in a single, unified view, it becomes possible to see relationships that were previously hidden, and only then does it make sense to start talking about automation.

When insight is actually put to use

The next step is often where many stop, because collecting telemetry data is not enough if it is not actively used in decisions. An important dimension here is that telemetry can also be forwarded to a SOC service, which turns the network into an active sensor in the security monitoring of the entire infrastructure.

This is where much of the strength of HPE Networking lies, not in generating more alarms, but in reducing noise and highlighting what is actually relevant.

This makes it possible to assess the likely cause of a problem, what should be prioritised first, and what can be handled without manual intervention.

Gradually more autonomy

At the start, much will still be manual, but as you gain confidence in the insight, more actions can be automated where they add value and where the risk is manageable.

This does not happen in one step, but gradually, and it is precisely this controlled progression that makes long term success possible.

According to a Nordic report carried out in collaboration with Radar last year, 72 per cent of organisations are still at script-based or centrally managed automation, and only 3 per cent have fully automated operations. This shows that most are well under way, but that there is still some way to go.

nLogic in practice

It is often in this phase that we work most closely with customers, not because the technology itself is difficult to adopt, but because the priorities around what to do first are crucial.

We help identify what delivers real impact, what can wait, and how to achieve improvements without creating new challenges.

Our experience is that it is often the simple measures that deliver the most value at the start, and that the right automation is more about quality than quantity.

When this works well, it is clearly noticeable: fewer cases are escalated, and the operations team gets more time to look ahead rather than dealing with incidents.