Enterprise AI Readiness in the Middle East: Bridging the Infrastructure Gap
This white paper emphasizes the critical role that modern data architectures play in enabling scalable, efficient, and enterprise-wide AI adoption.
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[Image source: Chetan Jha/MITSMR Middle East]
Across the Middle East region, governments and enterprises are rapidly investing in AI to drive economic diversification, public sector transformation, and private sector innovation. From Abu Dhabi’s $3.5 billion push to become the world’s first AI-native government by 2027 to Saudi Arabia’s $100 billion Project Transcendence, regional leaders are setting a bold agenda.
This white paper, Enterprise AI Readiness in the Middle East: Bridging the Infrastructure Gap, developed by MIT Sloan Management Review Middle East in collaboration with Pure Storage, explores the region’s current state of AI infrastructure readiness. It emphasizes the critical role that modern data architectures play in enabling scalable, efficient, and enterprise-wide AI adoption—and highlights the urgency for organizations to move beyond ambition toward operational execution.
Free Download: Enterprise AI Readiness in the Middle East: Bridging the Infrastructure Gap
AI Strategy and Execution in the Middle East
AI adoption is advancing across the region, with 46% of organizations surveyed moving beyond pilot phases to broader implementation. Still, 33% remain in early stages—focused on establishing foundational capabilities. This signals a region in transition, where national ambition is driving momentum, but organizational execution varies significantly.
Key drivers of success include access to high-quality data, cross-functional collaboration, and executive alignment. Yet challenges remain—particularly when it comes to integrating AI with legacy systems and scaling from isolated use cases to enterprise-wide platforms.
Data & Infrastructure Readiness
The research shows that AI success is inextricably tied to infrastructure maturity. Hybrid environments are emerging as the preferred model, adopted by 72% of organizations for their balance of scalability, security, and control.
However, data readiness remains a barrier. Only 33% of organizations report having more than 30% of their data accessible for AI use. Fragmented systems, poor visibility, and limited governance often restrict the value AI can deliver.
Moreover, integration complexity (67%) and outdated infrastructure (56%) are the most commonly cited obstacles. Without modern platforms designed for high-performance, low-latency workloads, enterprises struggle to scale AI use cases effectively.
Free Download: Enterprise AI Readiness in the Middle East: Bridging the Infrastructure Gap
AI Governance & Cross-Functional Alignment
AI initiatives succeed when strategic, technical, and operational teams are aligned. Organizations with mature AI governance models often assign ownership to data science teams (33%) or CIO/CDO leadership (28%), creating clear accountability.
Best practices include starting with high-impact use cases, maintaining regular checkpoints between teams, and prototyping to build consensus. Successful organizations treat AI as a multidisciplinary effort, aligning data, infrastructure, and business goals from the outset.
Operationalizing AI
Enterprises are increasingly moving from experimentation to deployment. 94% of survey respondents have adopted Gen AI or LLMs, while 89% use predictive analytics. Use cases range from customer service optimization to operational forecasting and healthcare diagnostics.
With adoption accelerating, the need for resilient, future-proof data infrastructure has never been more critical. Ahmed Soliman, Country Manager, UAE at Pure Storage, highlights this priority: “To successfully deploy AI, organizations need an architecture that’s never obsolete—one that eliminates data migration, unifies all essential data services for modern applications and AI workloads, and offers the flexibility to operate anywhere. This kind of infrastructure gives enterprises the freedom to scale AI seamlessly across locations, and we believe it is foundational to any successful AI deployment—regionally and globally.”
Ravi Raman, Publisher of MIT Sloan Management Review Middle East, reinforces this point: “AI readiness begins with infrastructure readiness. Without modern, scalable platforms, even the most promising AI initiatives risk stagnating in isolated pilots.”
This white paper is a timely and essential resource for business and technology leaders seeking to understand where their organizations stand in the region’s evolving AI landscape. It offers a data-driven look at AI infrastructure readiness, identifies key challenges and gaps, and provides actionable strategies to help enterprises scale AI effectively.
