The Keynote delivered by the Guest of Honour will consider the role of well-considered and focused policymaking in attracting the right investment to build the region’s digital future

As the Middle East undergoes digital transformation, what role will the data center industry play for the region’s citizens, businesses and Governments?  How will this role change and evolve? What examples are there of projects and innovations that are delivering this?

On-prem data centers and cloud services each offer different benefits for enterprise. What are the key questions and considerations when developing a Hybrid IT configuration? What are the proven benefits of doing so, and what are the risks? And how does the process impact the design and operation of the enterprise data center? 

 This challenge is one of the longest established and most intractable in the data center universe – more demand leads to higher densities which require more cooling and heat removal. Will it always be like this?   

The evolution of cyber-crime and the increasing threat it represents to cloud services means that protection is not just based on better cyber protection technologies. People, management systems, and digital strategies are now also on the line. In this session, we will take a deep dive into real-world case studies on cloud cyberattacks and appropriate response actions. 

 An average data center can use as much water as a town of 50,000 people. How can you adapt your operational practices to an era of greater water shortage and procure your technologies accordingly? What are the answers to this resource challenge? 

Hyperscale is associated with the largest data centers and the largest cloud and colo providers.  Which elements of design, construction and operation should be looked to understand the principles of delivering at scale? Scalability has traditionally been a capability associated with the largest, hyperscale data centers – how has it impacted how data centers across the Middle East are being designed and run? 

What role will Edge computing play in the Middle East’s digital transformation? Who will drive and lead the evolution? What forms will the delivery architecture need to take?

What impacts is the ‘skills shortage’ and the costs of labour having on data centers and associated industries across the Middle East? We select some of the brightest local and international visionaries to share their thoughts on how the region should face the future of labour in and around the data center and the role of different stakeholder groups in delivering this future.

 One of the key factors in the trend away from on-prem into colo and cloud has been the difficulty and cost of keeping up with the upgrades required for increasing densities in order to house ever more hungry apps. Colo can offer such upgrades as well as cloud access. Will the trend towards colo continue and with what customer impacts?