Microsoft has opened its first two data centres in the Middle East to meet the demand of a fourfold spending increase in cloud services forecast for the region between 2017 and 2022.
With new data centres in Abu Dhabi and Dubai, Microsoft’s global network has reached 54 and it will be launching eight more in the coming months.
The investment in data storage in Saudi Arabia and the UAE – the Arabian Gulf’s two largest economies – is set to rise to more than AED1.5 billion in 2022, according to International Data Corporation.
“There is a huge scope for cloud business… with new data centres driving digital transformation, economic growth and job creation in the region,” Sayed Hashish, general manager for Microsoft Gulf said.
Without divulging the exact amount Microsoft invested in UAE data centres, Hashish said: “We are investing billions of dollars across our data centres. Huge demand is giving us confidence to invest.”
“As all data stays in the UAE, it will enable government organisations to comply with local regulatory frameworks,” Hashish added.
The public cloud services market in the Middle East and North Africa is projected to grow to $1.9 billion by 2020, double what it was in 2016, according to Statista.
Microsoft’s technology and cloud services together will help create more than 110,000 jobs in Saudi Arabia and UAE by the end of 2022, according to IDC, with jobs in data science, blockchain architecture and AI.
“We anticipate the cloud services delivered from UAE to have a positive impact on job creation, entrepreneurship and economic growth across the region.”, said Hashish.
With this announcement, Microsoft has become the first of the Big Three cloud providers to open a data centre in the Middle East, beating out Amazon and Google.
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