Spending on enterprise application software (EAS) in the Middle East and North Africa is set to reach $774,62-million this year, reflecting year-on-year growth of 6,3%.
That’s according to the latest forecast from International Data Corporation (IDC), with the global technology research and consulting firm’s newly released report, “Middle East and North Africa EAS Market 2018-2022 Forecast and 2017 Vendor Shares”, tipping the market to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 6,1% over the 2018-2022 period.
The Gulf countries, particularly Saudi Arabia and UAE, continue to dominate spending in the market as they push ahead with their countrywide digital transformation initiatives. Shrinking budgets are forcing organizations across the region to shift from capex to opex business models, and this shift has spurred an increase in the adoption of cloud-based EAS solutions over the last couple of years, a trend that is set to accelerate over the coming years.
“The market has responded positively to ongoing national development plans and the continuous investments of EAS vendors across the region, with cloud-based EAS solutions gaining considerable traction in 2017,” says Manish Ranjan, IDC’s program manager for software in the Middle East, Turkey, and Africa.
“We are also seeing greater demand for intelligent ERP (i-ERP) solutions that come with embedded analytics and AI functionalities. Given the plethora of digital transformation initiatives underway across the region, the market for cloud-based EAS solutions will continue to expand in MENA, with government, transportation, healthcare, and utilities set to be among the fastest growing verticals in terms of EAS investments through 2022.”
IDC’s research shows that the overall MENA EAS market reached a value of $728,7-million in 2017, representing year-on-year growth of 6,3%. SAP was once again the market leader in 2017, followed by Oracle in second place and Microsoft in third. Together, these three vendors accounted for a combined market share of 82%.
“Data centre investments in the region continue to grow as vendors prepare themselves to address growing cloud demand and the spread of digital transformation initiatives,” explains Ranjan. “Both tier 1 and tier 2 vendors will continue to push cloud-based applications with embedded analytics and AI functionality in the market, and this will help cloud-based EAS solutions grow at a much faster rate than traditional on-premise solutions.”