Data specifics on the usage of hybrid cloud models in the United Arab Emirates were released on March 10 by global cloud computing leader Nutanix as part of its annual Enterprise Cloud Index (ECI) report.
Nutanix's published research, conducted by Vanson Bourne global technology market research experts, shows that the most favored type of cloud computing in both the UAE and Saudi Arabia is the hybrid cloud.
The company's report found that the UAE currently has one of the lowest percentages of hybrid cloud usage, even when 97 percent of enterprise decision-makers agree that the hybrid cloud model is the best fit and most secure. The country's two-year hybrid cloud growth projections show it progressing much further than EMEA (Europe, the Middle East and Africa) and global forecast expectations.
According to its respondents, the UAE plans on catching up to the world in the next three to five years, with an expected hybrid cloud penetration of 51 percent — a 44 percent rise from the current 7 percent. Nonetheless, other countries are expected to have the hybrid cloud up and running by that time.
"In the next few years, we'll see businesses rethinking how to best utilize hybrid cloud, including hiring for hybrid computing skills and reskilling IT teams to keep up with emerging technologies," stated Chief Information Officer of Nutanix Wendy M. Pfeiffer.
For the time being, companies in the UAE tend to make use of the private cloud much more than any other platform and most other countries. The GCC nation is expected to immensely decrease its use of both the private cloud and traditional data centers throughout the next five years.
Standing at 40 percent, the UAE has one of the lowest traditional data center usage percentages in the world. This could ease the country's transition into hybrid cloud models.
With that in mind, the UAE's predicted 22-percent usage of the private cloud in five years will still be higher than the EMEA and global averages of 16 and 12 percent, respectively.
What exactly is a hybrid cloud?
The hybrid cloud is only one of four types of cloud environments: the private, public, hybrid, and multi-clouds.
The hybrid cloud is essentially a fusion of public and private cloud computing. The ability to operate between the two clouds provides users with way more advantages than disadvantages. With the public cloud, the cost constantly goes up the more one uses it. However, the private cloud can be bought, installed, and maintained with the downside of a limited capacity but the upside of higher security.
"Hybrid cloud capabilities constitute a growing necessity in the dynamic, digital business climate, in which enterprises demand the freedom to dynamically provision and manage applications based on business needs," said Regional Sales Director of Nutanix Middle East Aaron White.
When operating a hybrid cloud, users have their private cloud on hand at all times; when needed, one can utilize the extra capacity a public cloud affords them.
The main difference between the hybrid cloud and multi-cloud is that the multi-cloud allows inter-operation between multiple public cloud services as opposed to the hybrid which works between public and private cloud environments.
More on the Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Index 2019
The Nutanix Enterprise Cloud Index (ECI) report is an annual appraisal on the usage of cloud computing services across multiple industries and countries including the Americas, EMEA, and the Asia-Pacific regions.
The research surveyed 2,650 Information Technology (IT) decision-makers from all over the globe to find that 85 percent of them believe that the hybrid cloud model is the most ideal operating model for their businesses.
In total, 73 percent are currently in the process of migrating applications away from the public cloud, with 60 percent saying that security is the greatest factor for the future of enterprise cloud strategies.
Although the usage of hybrid cloud computing currently stands at 13.1 percent, that number is expected to rise to 51.7 percent in the coming three to five years. Private cloud and traditional data centers are projected to drop from 34.4 and 52.8 percent to 15.7 and 15.8 percent, respectively.
That being said, 23.5 percent of the surveyed enterprises were discovered to not be using any kind of cloud environment. However, that number is expected to fall considerably in the coming two years, dropping to a mere 3 percent.