14 percent of CIOs in UAE have implemented Blockchain

According to a recent CIO survey published by HarveyNash/KPMG, chief information officers in UAE are not only more confident than global average in 4 out of 5 technology related capabilities but also have implemented more blockchain projects than their global counterparts.

When CIOs were asked which technologies they had implemented to some extent, a higher proportion of UAE CIOs had implemented five of the eight biggest emerging or established technologies compared to the global average. This included quantum computing (6 percent compared to 3 percent), blockchain (14 percent compared to 6 percent), augmented reality/virtual reality (19 percent to 9 percent), and robotic process automation (29 percent to 24 percent).

This shows that Chief information officers in the United Arab Emirates are quicker to deploy emerging tech like AI, blockchain, and quantum computing.

The survey, which claims to be the largest IT leadership study in the world, with more than 3,600 respondents across 108 countries, asked CIOs how effective their organization was at five key technology capabilities. Fifty-seven of the 3,600 respondents were from the UAE.

Though CIOs in UAE may be lagging behind their counterparts in other regions in cloud adoption, they are early implementers of various emerging technologies, the latest Harvey Nash/KPMG CIO Survey shows. Most of CIOs in UAE see the top priority for IT projects is to increase operational efificiency.

The survey also noted that 5% of those surveyed globally are working on small scale blockchain projects while 10% are piloting blockchain projects. In addition the biggest adoption is cloud.