DUBAI, Sept. 17 (Xinhua) -- Small and big enterprises can only prevail future competition if they adapt to a multi-cloud strategy to ensure smooth implementation of applications, an expert said on Monday.
"The United Arab Emirates (UAE) is the most advanced country in the Middle East when it comes to cloud solutions and multi-cloud offers for enterprises," said Tabrez Surve, regional director of Gulf and Turkey at U.S. tech company F5 Networks. He presented the survey-based study Future of Multi-Cloud (FOMC) report to the media.
Cloud-based information technology describes the shared pools of data resources and higher-level services such as applications.
According to Surve, a multi-cloud strategy is not a luxury but a must.
"The Future of Multi-Cloud report is a unique vision for how organizations can successfully navigate an increasingly intricate, cloud-centric world. The stakes are higher than ever, and businesses that ignore the power of the multi-cloud today will significantly struggle in the next five years," the expert pointed out.
IT spending of Middle East and North Africa is projected to reach 155 billion U.S. dollars in 2018, 3.4 percent higher from 2017, U.S. research firm and consultancy Gartner said in March.
Earlier in April, Sudheesh Nair, President of California-based Nutanix, a global cloud computing software company, told Xinhua that his company will set up another office in the UAE capital Abu Dhabi besides the first one in Dubai.
Software giant Microsoft said it is expected to open its first cloud sites in Abu Dhabi and Dubai by 2019.
As for data protection and regulation, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the far-reaching one, said Surve.
"However, the FOMC report concludes it is not enough in the long term, and a global standard for data protection is required within five years," he added.
Recent enactment of GDPR across the European Union requires firms to protect personal data and privacy of EU citizens. It also requires companies to protect transactions that happen in the EU member states.
