Publishing Edition 69 of the newsletter

Author: Rust-Trends

content/newsletter/69.md

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+title = "69 - Rust's Enterprise Breakthrough Year"
+date = "2025-08-31"
+slug = "rust-enterprise-breakthrough-2025"
+description = "Rust's 68.75% enterprise surge, 6x faster compile times, and the AI/ML revolution that's reshaping the language landscape in 2025."
+[extra]
+toc_not_generate = true
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+
+Welcome back to Rust Trends! 
+
+Something remarkable happened while you were enjoying your summer break: Rust quietly crossed the enterprise chasm. We're witnessing an adoption surge that only comes once in a programming language's lifetime, 68.75% enterprise growth, 6x faster compile times, and Fortune 500 companies betting their infrastructure on memory safety.
+
+This isn't just another year for Rust. This is **the** year.
+
+## The Enterprise Surge: 68.75% Growth Can't Be Ignored
+
+Let's be honest, when AWS, Microsoft, Google, and Meta all doubled down on Rust, we knew something significant was happening. The numbers don't lie: commercial Rust usage exploded by **68.75%** between 2021-2024, and throughout 2025 we've seen that trend accelerate. (<a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/2025/02/13/2024-State-Of-Rust-Survey-results/" target="_blank">Official 2024 State of Rust Survey Results</a>)
+
+**Shopify's Big Move**: Back in 2022, <a href="https://rustfoundation.org/media/welcoming-shopify-as-our-inaugural-gold-member/" target="_blank">Shopify became the Rust Foundation's inaugural Gold member</a>, and their commitment continues to grow. Their <a href="https://shopify.engineering/porting-yjit-ruby-compiler-to-rust" target="_blank">YJIT Ruby compiler implementation using Rust</a> has been a game-changer for Ruby performance. This isn't just about supporting open source; it's about betting their infrastructure on Rust's future.
+
+**The AWS Effect**: Amazon's <a href="https://firecracker-microvm.github.io/" target="_blank">Firecracker microVMs written in Rust</a> continue to prove Rust's enterprise readiness. When you're managing millions of serverless functions, memory safety isn't just nice to have, it's mission-critical.
+
+**Rust at Microsoft – Security-Driven Push** (May 2025) At Rust Nation UK, Microsoft ,<a href="https://www.infoq.com/news/2025/05/microsoft-cto-rust-commitment/?utm_source=chatgpt.com" target="_blank">Azure CTO Mark Russinovich detailed why Microsoft is scaling Rust adoption</a>. A decade of data showed that 70 percent of security vulnerabilities originated from unsafe memory usage in C/C++ code. Rust’s ownership model and memory safety directly address this risk. Microsoft is accelerating its migration from vulnerable C/C++ to safer Rust, especially for security-critical infrastructure.
+
+**Cloudflare Builds High-Performance AI Inference Engine in Rust** (August 2025)
+Cloudflare developed <a href="https://blog.cloudflare.com/cloudflares-most-efficient-ai-inference-engine/" target="_blank">Infire, a custom LLM inference engine written in Rust</a>. Infire delivers faster inference (up to 7% faster than vLLM) with lower CPU overhead and more efficient GPU utilization. It now powers Llama 3.1 8B on Cloudflare’s edge network.  
+
+**Why Now?**: The primary enterprise use cases tell the story: cloud infrastructure, high-frequency trading, blockchain, and IoT networks. These aren't experiments anymore; they're production workloads handling billions of requests.
+
+## ⚡ The Compilation Revolution: 6x Faster Builds
+
+Remember when Rust compile times were the running joke in our community? Those days are behind us. The performance improvements we've seen this year have been nothing short of revolutionary:
+
+- **6x faster compile times:** builds that took minutes now complete in seconds
+- **30% wall-time reduction** through the new lld linker as default
+- **Automatic cache cleanup** in Cargo (goodbye, disk space issues!)
+
+**What Changed?** The Rust releases throughout this year have delivered significant compiler optimizations and dependency resolution improvements. The sustained focus on <a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/2024/03/21/Rust-1.77.0.html" target="_blank">Rust compiler performance improvements</a> has been particularly impactful. It's the kind of behind-the-scenes change that transforms the entire development experience—making Rust not just safer than C++, but genuinely faster to iterate with.
+
+**Developer Experience**: This isn't just about numbers. Faster compilation means tighter feedback loops, more experimentation, and ultimately, happier developers. 
+
+The sustained 83% admiration rate we've seen in developer surveys? These compilation improvements are a big reason why.
+
+## The Compilation Revolution: 30% Faster Builds
+
+Remember when Rust compile times were the running joke in our community? Those days are fading. The performance improvements this year have been substantial:
+
+- **30%+ wall-time reduction** through the new <a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/2024/05/17/enabling-rust-lld-on-linux/" target="_blank">rust-lld linker</a> as default on Linux, with some benchmarks showing even larger gains.
+- **Automatic cache cleanup** in <a href="https://blog.rust-lang.org/2025/06/26/Rust-1.88.0/" target="_blank">Cargo</a>, so no more manual disk cleanup.
+
+**What Changed?** Recent Rust releases delivered major compiler optimizations, better dependency resolution, and defaulting to faster linkers. The sustained focus on compiler performance is transforming the development experience—making Rust not just safer than C++, but faster to iterate with.
+
+Developer Experience: Faster compilation means tighter feedback loops, more experimentation, and ultimately, a smoother workflow.
+
+## AI & Rust: The Unlikely Power Couple
+
+Python still rules machine learning research, but in 2025 Rust has carved out a clear role in production. AI workloads demand predictable performance, tight memory control, and reliability at scale—areas where Rust excels. The result: teams prototype in Python, then deploy with Rust.
+
+- **Candle** by Hugging Face is a <a href="https://github.com/huggingface/candle" target="_blank">Rust-native ML framework built for inference, not training</a>. It’s designed for serverless and edge environments where low latency and small binaries matter.
+- **Burn** is <a href="https://burn.dev/" target="_blank">another Rust-based deep learning framework</a>. It focuses on modular design and flexible backends, and is gaining attention for research and experimentation in Rust’s ecosystem.
+- **Rust–Python integration** is rising fast. Usage of <a href="https://pyo3.rs/" target="_blank">Rust for Python extensions</a> grew 22% year-over-year, showing how teams combine Python’s ergonomics with Rust’s performance in production.
+- **WebAssembly synergy** is giving edge AI new life. Candle already runs models directly in browsers via WASM, delivering near-native performance without a heavyweight runtime.
+
+The Bottom Line: Rust is not replacing Python in AI, but it’s becoming the language of choice for turning research prototypes into production-grade, efficient inference systems.
+
+## Tooling Spotlight: Zed Editor
+
+Speaking of developer experience, <a href="https://zed.dev/" target="_blank">Zed code editor</a> has been making waves this year. This Rust-written editor has been challenging VS Code's dominance, and the performance difference is noticeable. The collaborative features have proven innovative.
+
+**Why It Matters**: When developers increasingly choose tools written in Rust for their daily workflow, it reflects the language's maturity and ecosystem health.
+
+## Looking Ahead: The Rust Vision Doc
+
+The Rust team has been developing a high-level roadmap for the next few years. With the language's 10-year anniversary having passed this May (May 15, 2025), this year has been perfect for reflecting on how far we've come and where we're heading.
+
+**2025 Focus**: Rust’s H1 2025 efforts prioritized stabilizing compiler flags and tooling rather than launching new language features—a maturity-oriented shift that enterprises wanted to see. The language’s broader adoption in sectors like cloud, AI, and embedded systems suggests Rust’s role is expanding beyond traditional systems programming and more becoming a foundational language for enterprise infrastructure.
+
+## Snippets
+
+- **<a href="https://www.tiobe.com/tiobe-index/" target="_blank">Rust programming language hits #13 on TIOBE Index</a>** (February 2025 peak) and currently at #18
+- **<a href="https://crates.io/docs/trusted-publishing" target="_blank">Crates.io Trusted Publishing with OpenID Connect</a>** for secure CI/CD pipelines
+
+## The Inflection Point
+
+Looking at the data from 2024/2025, one thing becomes crystal clear: we're witnessing Rust's transition from "promising systems language" to "essential enterprise technology." The 68.75% adoption surge isn't just growth it's validation of a fundamental shift in how we think about systems programming.
+
+The Perfect Storm: Three factors converged this year to create Rust's breakthrough moment:
+1. **Enterprise readiness** through proven production deployments
+2. **Developer productivity** via faster compile times  
+3. **Market timing** as AI workloads demand memory-safe performance
+
+The combination of memory safety, performance, and ecosystem maturity has proven compelling. With compile times now faster and performance comparable to C++, the business case has written itself.
+
+But here's what excites me most: we're still in the early innings. If this is what Rust adoption looks like when the language is still evolving, imagine the landscape in 2026.
+
+What are you building with Rust this year? Hit reply and let me know, I love hearing about real-world Rust projects, and your stories often become the insights that shape these newsletters!
+
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