As enterprises move from AI experimentation to operational deployment, HPE Discover 2026 made clear that the biggest channel opportunity is not in infrastructure alone, but in the consulting, integration, governance, and managed services required to make that infrastructure useful.
Across HPE’s keynote messaging and partner conversations at HPE Discover 2026, a consistent theme emerged: customers know they need to prepare for AI, but many still lack the strategy, architecture, data readiness, governance, and cost controls to do so effectively.
That gap is creating a larger role for partners that can move beyond selling point products and help customers build AI-ready operating models.
Partners move from AI products to AI outcomes
During the event, HPE framed AI adoption as an architectural challenge spanning networking, compute, storage, security, data, and hybrid cloud.
Antonio Neri, HPE president and CEO, said during his keynote that “architecture for AI takes more than technology,” highlighting the role of people, processes, and partnerships in guiding customers through AI transformation.
That message aligns with what service providers and channel leaders are hearing in the field. Customers are no longer only asking whether they need AI infrastructure.
Increasingly, they are asking what that infrastructure should accomplish, how it should be governed, and how it fits into the broader business.
“The operating model for IT organizations has changed so dramatically… You’re no longer just building a data center and protecting that data center,” said Dante Orsini, chief revenue officer at 11:11 Systems.
Scott Steele, COO of Thrive, said the service provider’s AI conversations are less about AI as a standalone tool and more about embedding AI into how a business operates.
“I [think], most service providers are looking at AI as tools. And we look at AI as, how is AI operating?” Steele said. “How do you embed workflows in the operating model of your business? Those are the questions we need to ask.”
Consulting services become central to AI adoption
Christian Goffi, vice president of channel sales for the Americas at Nutanix, said partners are under pressure because customers know AI matters, but often do not know what to do next.
“You have customers with the pressure of, I don’t know what to do, but I have to do something,” Goffi said. “My board is expecting me to do something. And you have partners in the middle, and the expectation is that they’re the ones that provide the answer.”
Goffi argued the ecosystem needs to move away from point-solution selling and toward combining multiple vendor technologies with a services wrapper that solves a business problem.
READ MORE: AWS is moving its partner ecosystem in this direction as well.
Blending integration with consulting services tied to customer outcomes
He said partners should adopt more of a global systems integrator mindset, helping customers understand requirements for compute, storage, networking, cloud, security, and AI as part of a single, broader architecture.
That shift is especially important as customers confront complex migrations, new AI workloads, and ongoing infrastructure decisions following Broadcom’s changes to VMware licensing.
“When you’re focused on the outcome, you want to make sure that you’re constantly looking for the best possible technology that you can assemble into that solution stack,” said Orsini.
“Partners are key to that, not just the technology partners, but also the system integrators, the value-added resellers and service providers,” Orsini added
AI governance and token costs open new services lanes
The next services opportunity may also extend into AI governance and consumption management.
Steele said Thrive is already helping customers think through governance, observability, and AI sprawl, especially as organizations experiment with tools and begin to encounter token-related cost concerns.
He said midmarket customers are still early in that process, but partners have an opportunity to guide them before AI usage becomes unmanageable.
Goffi also pointed to token economics as a possible future consulting opportunity, comparing it to older telecom cost-optimization models.
As business units push for more AI usage, he said token spending could begin to compete with traditional IT budgets.
For MSPs, MSSPs, VARs, and service providers, that could translate into new advisory practices around AI usage policies, model selection, and cost routing.
HPE partner strategy supports service-led models
HPE’s broader partner strategy also appears to support this shift.
At Partner Growth Summit, the company announced new channel-only offerings, including HPE SimpliVity PC1000, HPE Private Cloud PC3000, and HPE Zerto Software beginning July 1.
HPE also introduced CloudOps Software for cloud service providers and has continued integrating Juniper’s partner program into HPE Partner Ready Vantage.
Those moves give partners more opportunity to build services around private cloud, virtualization modernization, cyber resilience, networking, and AI infrastructure.
“The fact that HPE can deliver those functions through a common platform really just helps us get to market quicker,” said Justin Giardina, chief technology officer at 11:11 Systems.