The Middle East, Turkey and Africa (META) region will see annual spending on digital transformation (DX) initiatives cross the USD 20 billion mark by the end of this year, according to the latest insights from International Data Corporation (IDC). The global technology research and advisory services firm expects this figure to more than double over the coming years, passing USD 40 billion by 2022 as the pursuit of game-changing innovation accelerates to keep pace with evolving customer demands.
“As digital transformation continues to reshape the global economy, innovation will multiply, platform wars will intensify, and data will increasingly be used for competitive advantage. And with market leadership ranks being disrupted, a new ICT world order is taking shape, built around innovative technology offerings, evolving business models, and emerging DX use cases,” said Jyoti Lalchandani, Group Vice President and Regional Managing Director, IDC Middle East, Africa and Turkey.
By 2020, IDC expects at least 55 percent of the world’s organizations to be digitally determined, transforming markets and re-imagining the future through the implementation of new business models and the provision of digitally enabled products and services. And with global DX investments forecast to total USD 5.9 trillion for the three years between 2018 and 2021, this topic continues to be a central area of business leadership thinking.
The subject will sit at the heart of the IDC Middle East CIO Summit 2019 in Dubai next February, as more than 200 of the region’s most influential ICT leaders gather to discuss strategies for succeeding in an era of multiplied innovation and automation. Combining a varied mix of informative presentations, panel discussions and workshops, the Summit’s agenda for 2019 has been designed to help the region’s CIOs rethink the way they leverage information, harness emerging ICT solutions, and facilitate organization-wide innovation, with the aim of making their enterprises more agile, efficient, and productive than ever before.
The rise of disruptive automation will feature prominently, with an agenda that centers on the transformative powers of innovation accelerators such as robotics, artificial intelligence, big data analytics, next-gen security, and the Internet of Things.
In the 2019 edition, IDC will be hosting a Tech Startup Zone on the sidelines of the Summit to showcase the region’s facilities for incubating digital startups, while a dedicated Innovation Center will explore recent advances in the areas of robotics, smart cars, AR/VR, 3D printing, artificial intelligence and hologram technology.
