How open source is fast becoming an innovative platform for digital transformation in Qatar – The Peninsula

Open source solutions are accelerating the innovation and adoption for cloud, big data and analytics, the Internet of Things (IoT), artificial intelligence (AI) and blockchain. An agile, cost-effective and flexible alternative to proprietary software there is no better way to achieve connectivity on a massive scale without relying on open source frameworks and platforms within digital infrastructures.

As most countries in the Middle East activate national digital transformation initiatives to drive economic diversification, open source solutions will continue to gain momentum across the region. Open source is becoming increasingly omnipresent across the IT stack, particularly as organisations look to drive innovation while maintaining operational and cost efficiencies.

The State of Enterprise Open Source 2022 report revealed that not only is the open source development model showing no signs of slowing down, it has actually accelerated during the pandemic.

The report, which explores why enterprise leaders are choosing the open source development model and technologies built with this model, found that 92 percent of IT leaders surveyed feel enterprise open source solutions are important to addressing their COVID-related challenges.

As organisations build out their digital competencies to gain a competitive edge, improve customer engagement, and enhance their services, they are increasingly extending their infrastructure and applications to run on cloud.

Whether an intentional architecture choice or a result of rapid market changes, cloud computing and always-on services built using the open source development model and open source code are increasingly crucial to nearly every organisation regardless of industry.

In fact, 89 percent of respondents believe that enterprise open source software is as secure or more secure than proprietary software. Anyone who has spent time in the IT industry will recognise that this is a significant shift from mainstream perceptions about open source software from a decade or so ago when open source software security often surfaced as a weakness.

The use of open source will continue to rise as organisations increasingly adopt agile development frameworks and tools to modernise existing applications and build new, cloud-native applications or services.

Awareness of open source in the Middle East has risen significantly in recent years. In fact, new technologies are set to play a major role in achieving key objectives of Qatar Digital Government strategy to increase government openness and generate economic and political value by collaborating with customers. To this end, government entities, research and educational institutes, and open source IT vendors have been playing an active role in promoting both the awareness and use of open source across the region.

Red Hats annual survey revealed that 82 percent of IT leaders globally are more likely to select a vendor who contributes to the open source community. Data also revealed the top reasons why enterprise open source vendors are preferred: They are familiar with open source processes (49 percent); They help sustain healthy open source communities (49 percent); They can influence the development of features that we need (48 percent); and They are going to be more effective if I face technical challenges (46 percent).

Across the Middle East, sectors such as telecommunications, banking and financial services, education, and healthcare have been using open source to optimise and simplify operations, reduce costs, and facilitate their digital agendas. As digital transformation and cloud become mainstream in the Middle East, demand for open source solutions and skills will intensify.

Unsurprisingly, the increasing use of enterprise open source extends to important new emerging technology workloads, with 80 percent planning to increase their use of enterprise open source in areas such as artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning (ML), edge computing, and the Internet of Things (IoT).

As organisations in Qatar increasingly pursue digital transformation and innovation, open source adoption will have a pivotal role to play. Organisations should consider working with established commercial open source solution providers and their channel ecosystems in order to secure the support and skills needed to adopt open source solutions.

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How open source is fast becoming an innovative platform for digital transformation in Qatar - The Peninsula