MANILA, PHILIPPINES — A majority (85%) of Philippine businesses plan a full-scale cloud migration in two years, while more than nine in ten (91%) of them will increase their investment in cloud in 2023, according to a survey entitled “The Next-Generation Cloud Strategy in Asia.” The survey was commissioned by Alibaba Cloud, the digital technology and intelligence backbone of Alibaba Group.
The survey found that the surge of interest among local businesses is driven mainly by the rapid growth of the local data center market (78%) and the government’s steadfast plan for digitalization (79%). When it comes to selecting cloud vendors, security (85%), availability (74%), and expertise (62%) are the key factors considered by Philippine businesses, the survey shows. Businesses in the Philippines lead the pack on prioritizing security among its Asian counterparts followed by Indonesia (82%) and Thailand (78%).
Speaking at a roundtable event revealing the key findings about the Philippine market from the Asia-wide survey, Allen Guo, Country Manager for the Philippines at Alibaba Cloud Intelligence, stated, “Alibaba Cloud has prioritized providing highly scalable, robust and secure infrastructure to Philippine businesses. As we anticipate a rise in cloud adoption, Alibaba Cloud is committed to offering innovative and proven cloud solutions and services to Philippine businesses.”
The survey generated responses from 1,000 organizations in various industries including financial services, IT, manufacturing, media & telecommunications, and retail across eight Asian markets including the Philippines that are currently using cloud services. Alibaba Cloud commissioned global market research firm NielsenIQ to conduct the survey, with the aim to better understand the state of adoption of the prevailing cloud strategies across Asia.
New solutions to improve business efficiency and sustainability
During the event hosted by Alibaba Cloud, the global leading cloud service provider introduced new enterprise and sustainability solutions, including Wuying Workspace and Energy Expert, to meet Philippine customers’ intelligent transformation demands.
To provide Philippine businesses with unlimited computing power without making significant upfront hardware investments, Alibaba Cloud offers Wuying Workspace, a convenient and secure cloud-based solution that enables desktop environments to be created, deployed, and managed quickly and easily.
This one-stop Elastic Desktop Service (EDS) solution provides enterprise users with access to organizational resources regardless of whether they are at home or in the office, thus supporting hybrid working models. It also addresses the data security challenges faced by many IT departments as they adopt flexible working arrangements, thanks to the solution storing information in the cloud, rather than on a device.
As businesses embrace cloud technology, reducing their impact on the environment is also becoming a priority. In the Philippines, almost all (98%) of the surveyed businesses favor cloud vendors focused on sustainability.
To support Philippine businesses’ quest to fulfill their sustainability goals, Alibaba Cloud introduced its sustainability solution, Energy Expert. It measures, analyzes, and manages the carbon emissions of business activities and products while providing actionable insights and energy-saving recommendations to companies, helping them to achieve their carbon emission goals.
Nurturing IT talent and growing with partners and clients
Among the Philippine businesses surveyed, the majority said that insufficient training for employees is among the top barriers to cloud adoption. To help address this challenge, Alibaba Cloud has partnered with local IT-focused educational institutions – such as Asia Pacific College – to train and strengthen the cloud computing competencies of teachers and students as part of its efforts to support local digital talent empowerment in the Philippines.
“The future landscape of cloud computing lies in the hands of the next generation, and as educators, it is our duty to foster and nurture their digital talents. Our recent collaboration with Alibaba Cloud has been instrumental in accelerating our mission to equip students with the essential tools to thrive in the current scenario, especially with the rising demand for cloud computing in local businesses,” said Rhea-Luz Valbuena, Executive Director of the School of Computing and Information Technologies at the Asia Pacific College.
While committed to digital talent empowerment, Alibaba Cloud also works with partners and clients to offer localized solutions to serve the needs of digital transformation in the Philippines. It has recently established a strategic partnership with Globe Business to offer Philippine enterprises comprehensive cloud solutions better customized to their specific needs.
“As a key player in the local telecommunications industry, we partnered with Alibaba Cloud to deliver enhanced efficiency, reduced latency and strengthened data sovereignty to our customers. Globe’s strategic move to a ‘techco’ from a telco allows us to expertly pave the way for the digital transformation of enterprises, solidifying our position at the forefront of the industry,” said Kristofferson de Ocampo, Field CTO for Cloud and Cybersecurity at Globe Business.
Greg Igaya, Vice President for Technology and DevOps for GCash, emphasized the significance of security in cloud adoption, “As a client from the financial industry, Alibaba Cloud has enabled us to fortify our technology infrastructure, reinforcing our ability to offer reliable and secure financial services.”
As the leading public cloud service provider in Asia Pacific, Alibaba Cloud offers its expertise in cloud technology to provide a range of world-class solutions, including elastic compute, database, security, storage and network services and machine learning and data analytics capabilities, to address issues and challenges in the different key industries in the Philippines.
