10 breakthrough stories to help you turn 2026 ambitions into reality

Welcome to 2026. As we look back at the final weeks of 2025, it is clear that our industry has shifted from “what if” to “how to.” Last year was defined by the move from AI experimentation to production-grade reality, the hardening of cloud-native security, and the rise of unified automation platforms. Whether our community was focused on scaling hundreds of clusters or slashing VM provisioning times from months to minutes, the goal remained consistent: building a foundation that is security-focused, scalable, and resilient.

1. Getting Started with Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization

Whether you are looking to migrate away from a legacy virtualization platform or simply want a unified control plane for both virtual machines (VMs) and containers, Red Hat OpenShift provides a centralized solution. This guide walks you through the foundational steps of using OpenShift Virtualization—from installing the necessary operators on bare metal to deploying your first VM. You’ll also learn how the migration toolkit for virtualization (MTV) can help you bring existing workloads from VMware or Red Hat OpenStack Services on OpenShift  into a modern, Kubernetes-native environment. By integrating VMs into your standard container workflows, you can manage all your services under a single, automated platform.

2. Introducing the Red Hat Ansible Lightspeed intelligent assistant

As IT industries grow in complexity, the pressure to automate is higher than ever—but you shouldn’t have to be a veteran "Ansible-whisperer" to get the job done. This post introduces the Red Hat Ansible Lightspeed intelligent assistant, a gen AI service embedded directly within Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform. Discover how this tool acts as a subject matter expert (SME) at your keyboard, using a retrieval augmented generation (RAG) pipeline to pull from official Red Hat documentation. Whether you are troubleshooting an error code or configuring Event-Driven Ansible, learn how Ansible Lightspeed reduces "swivel-chair" operations and helps your team build, deploy, and manage automation faster than ever.

3. Red Hat to acquire Chatterbox Labs: Frequently Asked Questions

As organizations move from AI experimentation to full-scale production, a new challenge has emerged: ensuring models are safe, unbiased, and secure. This FAQ explores Red Hat’s acquisition of Chatterbox Labs, a pioneer in gen AI guardrails and model-agnostic safety. Learn how the integration of their AIMI platform into the Red Hat AI portfolio provides the quantitative risk metrics and real-time monitoring needed to deploy production workloads with confidence.

4. The end of static secrets: Ford’s OpenShift strategy

Managing over 200 clusters across a global manufacturing giant isn't just an infrastructure challenge; it’s a security one. This post dives into the strategy shared by Ford at Red Hat OpenShift Commons gathering, where they’ve implemented a "keyless" mandate. Discover how Ford, alongside partners like CyberArk, abandoned static secrets in favor of 100% identity-driven automation and Policy as Code (PoC). From resilient certificate lifecycles to enforcing security via Kubernetes admission controllers, learn how Ford is building a self-healing foundation ready for the next era of AI workloads.

5. Demystifying llm-d and vLLM: The race to production

As engineering teams move AI from laptop prototypes to production clusters, a common question arises: "Should we use vLLM or llm-d?" The answer isn't about choosing one—it’s about understanding how they work together to win the race. In this post, we break down the AI stack using a racing lens: think of vLLM as your high-performance Formula 1 engine and llm-d as the expert pit crew and race strategist.

6. Accelerating open source development with AI

As gen AI enters the developer workflow, skepticism in open source communities is high—and for good reason. In this post, Red Hat leadership and open source maintainers explore how we can adopt AI without losing the "human-in-the-loop" accountability that defines open source. Learn about Red Hat’s 3 core principles for AI adoption: innovating responsibly, being transparent, and respecting the community.

7. Don’t just automate, validate: How to measure and grow your return on investment

Technical excellence is the foundation of automation, but scaling that success requires a different skill: translating code into business impact. This post explains how to use the automation dashboard and automation analytics within Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform to turn operational metrics into an auditable business case. Stop guessing your impact and start proving it with data-driven insights that win leadership buy-in.

8. AI ambitions meet automation reality: The case for a unified automation platform

IT leaders are racing to implement AI, but many are finding their progress stalled by a "DIY dilemma." With 72% of organizations managing up to 50 different tools, the patchwork approach to infrastructure is becoming a major roadblock to innovation. This post shares insights from Red Hat and S&P Global Market Intelligence on why a unified automation platform is the essential foundation for AI.

9. Slash VM provisioning time on Red Hat Openshift Virtualization using Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform

In many enterprises, requesting a new VM can take a staggering 60 to 90 days. But what if you could deliver a fully configured, security-patched VM in under an hour? This post breaks down the 3 pillars of a modern IT service platform: Red Hat Developer Hub, Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization, and Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform.

10. Solving tool overload, one automation step at a time

Modern IT departments aren't just managing infrastructure; they’re managing a "tool sprawl" that often reaches into the hundreds. This post explores findings from a 451 Research survey of 900 IT leaders to define the "unified IT automation platform." Discover why 69% of enterprises are turning to platform engineering to integrate their toolboxes and make complex AI and DevOps workflows work together.

What’s next? 

The stories that dominated our 2025 year-end reflect a fundamental truth for 2026: the power of a unified approach. Whether it’s integrating Red Hat OpenShift Virtualization to modernize legacy workloads or utilizing Red Hat Ansible Lightspeed to bridge the skills gap, Red Hat remains committed to the open source tools that empower enterprises to lead.

As we step into this new year, the focus remains on transparency, security, and human-centric innovation. By applying these principles, you aren’t just keeping up with the industry—you’re setting the pace for the next wave of digital transformation. We hope these insights help you build an even more efficient, automated, and security-focused environment in 2026.