UAE and Kuwait to Get More Data Centers by Google Cloud

Google Cloud plans expansion of more data centers in the regions of the Middle East

The Middle East is a crucial market and one of the fastest-growing countries for Alphabet's Google, which is investing billions of dollars globally to compete with giants Amazon and Microsoft in the cloud arena. Google is evaluating plans to create new data centers in the regions of UAE and Kuwait.

According to Thomas Kurian, the CEO of Google Cloud, the firm, which is already constructing data centers by Google Cloud in Saudi Arabia and Qatar and has just inaugurated a new Google cloud area in Israel, is looking at a number of options. There are numerous conversations taking place in other nations, according to Mr. Kurian. "We haven't said that yet, but we are obviously considering a number of locations such as Kuwait, the UAE, and other places are potential locations." There are typically three data centers in the middle east in each new cloud region that Google Cloud creates.

Therefore, the kingdom itself has three data centers, as do Qatar and Israel. Each of the locations we disclose is a trio," he said, declining to say how much the corporation intends to invest in the area.

We don't disclose our financial information publicly, but you can imagine that each cloud area receives capital investments in the hundreds of millions of dollars or higher, according to Mr. Kurian.

All of these initiatives span several years, and when the business constructs data centers, "we're looking at an eight- to 10-year horizon since it's a huge investment," the company says.

The company's effort to expand globally includes a campaign to do business in the Middle East. It presently has 106 data centers and 35 live cloud regions. Google, a subsidiary of Alphabet, recently declared plans to create 14 additional cloud zones worldwide.

The fastest-growing regions for Google Cloud are the Middle East and Asia, and the company anticipates that trend to continue over the next five years as it broadens its regional presence.

Global software and technology companies are vying with one another to open offices in the area and aggressively grow their market shares.

With the second cloud region in the UAE, Amazon Web Services (AWS) hopes to improve its standing in the market. Other companies building their data centers in the second-largest economy in the Arab world include IBM and Alibaba.

Google Cloud has had exponential growth in the Middle East region to date, and Mr. Kurian is working hard to keep it rolling.

"To give you an idea, three years ago, neither our go-to-market organization nor our local partner ecosystem existed. That wasn't available to us, he said.

Global software and technology companies are vying with one another to open offices in the area and aggressively grow their market shares.

We currently have a direct presence in five nations. You will observe our growth in the years to come, and we will at least maintain our current rate of growth.

One of the G20 countries with the fastest-growing economies in Saudi Arabia. As the country develops, Mr. Kurian said, "we expect technology to become a bigger part of the overall economic growth, so we're sure that our business will continue to grow [there]."

We firmly believe that tendency will continue.

Government ministries, the telecom sector, banks, and financial institutions, as well as industries including travel and tourism, and retail are among its clients in the area. Its service businesses include the e-commerce platform Noon and the online clothing shop Namshi.

Businesses in the Middle East and Africa are using cloud adoption to reduce overall operational costs, increase profitability, and effectively handle market disruptions brought on by COVID-19.

Grand View Research predicts that between 2022 and 2030, the global cloud computing market, which was valued at $368.97 billion in 2018, would grow at a compound annual rate of around 16%. Emerging technologies like AI and machine learning will be some of this market's primary drivers. The cloud continues to be Alphabet's fastest-growing business, with total cloud revenue rising by 38% yearly to $6.8 billion between July and September. Alphabet is the parent company of Google. Due to investments, Google has been among the cloud service providers with the fastest global growth over the last three years. According to Thomas Kurian, despite the fact that there are many different rivals and a sizable number of them, the cloud market as a whole is fairly large.