GCC public cloud adoption on upward trend

The adoption of the cloud across the GCC region will continue to increase in the coming years, with the GCC public cloud market expected to grow from $956 million in 2020 to $2.35 billion in 2024, experts said.

Speaking during a webinar on accelerated cloud adoption and data center management on Thursday, Harish Dunakhe, research director for Software & Cloud at IDC, noted that hybrid cloud adoption is rising in the GCC region and that business continuity is a top priority. He also noted that the current situation with the Covid-19 pandemic has put the spotlight on working from home for many companies and that, in turn, has brought a new focus on cloud spending.

Enterprise IT spending is set to fall to about five per cent in the GCC, with the biggest impact expected in Saudi Arabia followed by the UAE, he revealed. IDC's research also showed that the GCC public cloud market, which includes IaaS, SaaS, and PaaS, is expected to grow from $956 million this year to $2.35 billion in 2024, at an annual growth rate of 25 per cent. IaaS is expected to grow by about 33 per cent and SaaS by 24 per cent this year.

Dunakhe also identified a shift in what CIOs consider to be a priority at the moment. Over 50 per cent of CIOs are expanding on their existing digital transformation efforts in order to improve agility and efficiency; while 48 per cent of organisations say that they want to continue with their planned digital transformation initiatives.

"We are also seeing an accelerated adoption of technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI) - 33 per cent of CIOs said that they are going to be spending more on AI," he said.

Similarly, Santiago Freitas, head of Technology for Middle East & Africa at Amazon Web Services (AWS), agreed and identified a "titanic adoption of the cloud."

"People want to move to the cloud for the agility it provides," he said and identified two more technological trends that will be of interest to companies including Machine Learning and the Internet of Things.

Tanya Koval, head of Enterprise Architecture, Infrastructure & Workplace at FAB, noted that the conversation has evolved to what the demands are of the business rather than the constraints of the business.

"Banks in many ways are still very traditional," she said. "The cloud is a major disruptor on how teams are restructured and how skills are utilised. We are seeing that it helps to build loyal staff because it helps you utilise their existing skills set, and it helps to build on their other skills as well."