Stockholm – – September 28, 2026 -- More than half of senior enterprise leaders, 58%, have delayed, scaled back or added safeguards to strategic initiatives over the past two years due to concerns about their network provider, according to a new report from Arelion.
The Stockholm-based connectivity firm commissioned research firm Savanta to survey 518 senior enterprise network decision-makers across the US, UK, Germany and France, all from organizations with more than 2,000 employees. The findings appear in Arelion's report, 'The trust illusion: Why AI and digital transformation need more than a reliable network.'
AI and data projects suffer the most disruption from provider trust issues
AI and data-driven initiatives were the most affected, cited by 49% of respondents who reported disruption. Security and compliance programs followed at 44%, digital transformation at 42%, cloud migrations at 38%, and market expansion and new product launches each at 30%. A further 30% of leaders said they had introduced additional resilience or risk-mitigation measures around these initiatives.
Confidence collapses when leaders imagine a real network failure
While 93% of respondents say they largely or completely trust their current provider, only 15% report complete confidence in that provider's ability to detect and resolve a serious network issue quickly. A third report only moderate or some confidence. Separately, 42% say their provider falls seriously short of expectations at least a few times a year, with some reporting monthly shortfalls.
Leaders ranked protection against security threats as the top trust factor (48%), ahead of reliability and uptime (44%) and performance and latency (37%).
Nearly one in five leaders foresee severe financial or reputational damage from a provider failure
If their network provider suffered a serious failure tomorrow, 40% of leaders expect major operational disruption, and 18% anticipate significant financial loss or severe reputational damage, a figure that rises to 23% among US respondents.
Enterprises will pay up to 20% more for demonstrated trustworthiness
Trust is shaping vendor selection: 65% of leaders say it is the dominant or deciding factor in what they are willing to pay for network services. Some 98% say they would pay more for a provider that consistently demonstrates trustworthiness, with 72% willing to pay 6% to 20% more and an additional 13% willing to exceed that range. Transparency was cited as the top factor to earn trust (38%), ahead of reliability and uptime (22%) and security and data privacy (14%).
Leaders flag AI-driven network management as the next trust challenge
54% of respondents identify AI and automation in network management and security as the biggest future challenge to trust, ahead of data sovereignty requirements (39%), geopolitical instability (39%), regulatory pressures (38%) and quantum computing threats to encryption (38%). Overall, 85% of leaders expect trust in network providers to grow more important over the next three years.
"These findings make it clear that trust is no longer a soft metric," said Mattias Fridström, Chief Evangelist at Arelion. "Trust is influencing which strategic initiatives move forward, how organizations manage risk, and which providers they choose to work with."