Dubai: Many regional businesses have not fully defined the role of Chief Information Officers (CIO), however, and so may be facing major challenges ahead despite the rapid development of information and communications technology (ICT), a top research firm official said.
"As a comprehensive response to the challenges, IDC is organising the region's first-ever CIO Summit in which nearly 100 CIOs from Middle East's leading IT and communications firms are set to take part," Jyoti Lalchandani, Vice-President and Regional Managing Director of IDC Middle East and Africa, said.
He said with the scale of development projects being undertaken in the region increasing and the level of investment in solutions rising, managing technology and harnessing it to achieve business success is a key challenge for many medium-sized and large enterprises in the Middle East.
Compounding the challenges facing companies is the exponential increase in data generated by business operations.
According to IDC, organisations in the Middle East invested in more than 63,000 terabytes of storage capacity in 2007 - more than double than in the previous year. Designed to help overworked CIOs tackle the challenges of managing, planning, and matching technology to business goals, the summit will take place on March 16-17 in Dubai.
"The two-day event will focus on the big-picture trends shaping the ICT industry and business practices," he said.
A major focus of the event will be the challenge of moving from a reactive management style through to proactive management and long-term planning, tackling issues ranging from leveraging worker mobility to cost reduction through energy-efficient hardware.
"The event will provide a priceless opportunity for industry insiders to discuss and share their unique solutions for overcoming day-to-day professional challenges and establishing long-term technical and professional goals," said Lalchandani.
IDC forecasts that by 2011, total IT spending in the region (covering the Gulf, Levant, and Egypt) will reach approximately $16 billion (Dh58.72 billion), and almost double the spending levels recorded in 2006. Economic growth, expansion of oil and gas production, real estate and stock market booms, and high oil prices, shaped the overall economic situation in the region last year.
"Essentially, organisations have to take inventory of the latest threats, assess how they apply to their particular organisations, then balance IT security investments accordingly, recognising that security is a process and that it starts with a sound network and clear policies that get enforced," said Lalchandani.
"Decision makers need to also understand their human resource capacity [a real scarcity in the region] and try to ascertain what aspects of their security operations [if any]) can be outsourced to a - whether to a vendor, a service provider, or even a telco," he added.
