Rolling Out AI at Anaqua: A CIO's Honest Account at Foundations 2026

Anaqua, an intellectual property management software provider handling assets worth hundreds of millions of dollars, has adopted a tightly governed approach to AI because its rules-based workflows require accuracy, consistency, and careful limits on write access. CIO Erik Bailey selected CData Connect AI as a centralized control plane for managing AI connectivity, permissions, and context across business systems, ensuring that queries run under each logged-in user’s identity while limiting unauthorized changes and preventing shadow AI or uncontrolled MCP connector use. After beginning with Microsoft Copilot and expanding through an early 2026 Claude pilot, Anaqua made Claude available company-wide and is developing use cases such as Customer 360 views and automated improvement of its AI Skills based on query failures. Bailey will discuss Anaqua’s transition from AI pilots to production, its governance practices, the AI gateway category, and future plans during a November 5, 2026 Foundations 2026 session with CData CMO Will Davis, aimed at CIOs and AI leaders responsible for enterprise-wide AI adoption.

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