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Saudi Arabia is racing towards the 2030 vision and digital transformation both in the public and private sectors are key to that

Imdath Nazim

Head of IT, (IHG)Voco Hotel Riyadh

Saudi Arabia has the largest Information and Communications Technology (ICT) market in the Middle East and North Africa, with over 33 million consumers, and it is well-positioned to become a technology service and cloud hub with access to international connectivity. The Kingdom is poised to become a world leader in the digital economy with deployment of new technologies such as Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), Blockchain, Big Data, Robotics, Machine Learning, and 5G across public and commercial sectors.

It was one of the first nations in the world whose institutions began to experiment with the usage of blockchain and permitted multinational enterprises desiring to test innovative digital solutions and to deploy them in the KSA in future. There is a technology revolution in the country. Once entirely focused on oil, Saudi Arabia's economy is rapidly modernizing and diversifying. During the last year, the country's enterprises have embraced digital transformation and migrated to the cloud at a rapid pace. A new generation that considers new technologies to be one of the main components of their lifestyle has had a significant impact on the rapid transformation and on the other hand, technology giants are joining the race to entrench themselves in the Saudi Market by establishing regional offices and Cloud data centers.

“Saudi Arabia is a very important market for technology companies. The advanced IT infrastructure, wide geographical distribution, e-government initiatives, electronic banking, electronic-based education, and many other factors make it a ripe technology market. Many nationals have the entrepreneur mindset, and technology helps them achieve their goal,” says Imdath Nazim, Head of IT, (IHG)Voco Hotel Riyadh.

Digital transformation is constantly affecting businesses across the Kingdom's public and private sectors, from national-level data management systems to human capital development portals. ICT decision-makers are designing and executing strategies to use new technologies not just to fit with national digital transformation initiatives, but also to address critical business concerns. Digital technologies play an important role in allowing the Vision Realization Programs (VRPs) that are assisting in the realization of Saudi Arabia's Vision 2030. One of the key goals of Vision 2030's National Transformation Program is to support digital transformation and the development of the digital economy.

“I believe there is an evident change in the technology industry in KSA as a result of the Saudi Vision 2030. The vision focuses on various areas but one of the main focus is digital transformation for companies. With the digital transformation journey, other elements are incorporated as cybersecurity, AI/ML, IoT, Big Data etc. This focus aligns with the visions of the companies as well. The result can be witnessed in the market with various events like @HACK, LEAP etc.” said Abdelmajed Ahmed Saeed Fadol, Cybersecurity Manager, MEDGULF.

KSA has been investing in creating a strong digital infrastructure, to accelerate the digital revolution. This has helped the Kingdom to deal with public and private sector disruptions while maintain-

ing commercial continuity, educational activities, citizen needs, and daily resident life. In a turn to build a stronger digital foundation, many new technologies were implemented by almost all of the CIOs across the region. The COVID 19 pandemic and the need for remote working support also aided in this transformation. Cloud adoption has accelerated in the recent past.

Cloud adoption was one of the major decisions taken by many IT decision-makers. According to recent IDC, public cloud spending in Saudi Arabia is expected to exceed $950 million in 2022 and reach $1.3 trillion in 2025, demonstrating how much the country is embracing cloud services. NEOM, Saudi Arabia's flagship $500 billion business zone, is in negotiations with corporations to select the main partner for its first cloud computing contract, which would establish the groundwork for high-tech services in its flagship $500 billion business zone.

“In Boudl Hotels Group, we had the biggest Cloud transformation project in Saudi Arabia for the year 2021, moving more than 50 hotels from the on Premises PMS system to the Cloud system based on unified standard and platform for all our hotels group,” said Osama Merghani, Group IT Director, Braira Hotels and Resorts.

“The shift to cloud based technologies has been the subject of an argument between those who favored the cloud and believe in the high security and reliability standards of the cloud service provider; and the others who prefer the traditional way of keeping the data on-premises and build their own data center. Digital transformation trend came to prove the efficiency, reliability, security and productivity of Cloud systems concept; the transformation to the cloud became a mandatory plan for most of companies,” he added.

The government is the most important driver of digital activities, with various modernization projects that use the cloud as a foundation layer. Continuous investments in new datacenters by local and global technology providers in the kingdom have boosted cloud adoption since these locally situated facilities comply with Saudi Arabia's data residency and governance rules.

There has also been an increase towards deployments of hybrid multicloud architectures, which combine public and private clouds with traditional on-premises infrastructure. However, the market continues to encounter issues related to cloud knowledge and skills, legacy infrastructure that is inappropriate for cloud migration, and a mindset that views cloud as insecure.

On the cybersecurity front, the government is taking measures to ensure strong cyber protection measures are in place across the public and private sectors.

“The National cybersecurity authority has both regulatory and operational cybersecurity functions, and it collaborates closely with public and private entities to improve the country's cybersecurity posture in order to protect vital interests, national security, critical infrastructures etc. There is also better awareness on cybersecurity issues and threats in the kingdom,” said Abdelmajed. “There is no doubt Saudi Arabia is one of the most targeted Countries by Cyber-attacks since it’s the biggest economy in the region, the recent Aramco ransomware attack on July 2021 is an example of the importance of having efficient cyber security policies and systems, its crucial to protect the systems against attacks but it’s more important to have a proper system recovery plan in case of data breach incidents,” said Osama.

Osama Merghani

Group IT Director, Braira Hotels and Resorts

As the country races towards accomplishing the various milestones of the 2030 vision, Technologies will continue to play a key role in accomplishing them and alongside companies based out of the Kingdom will also need to keep pace with the expectations of the economy that is fast integrating with a digital future.