Bahrain’s cloud-first success story

Cloud computing, automation, and AI are driving a new wave of modernization in public services. They’re helping to make them more accessible, responsive, and cost-effective, delivering almost $10 trillion in public value by 2034, according to the World Economic Forum.

The Kingdom of Bahrain shows how this can be done. Through a cloud-first strategy, the country has modernized its public services, boosted economic growth, and developed a culture of innovation.

With more than 85 percent of its government’s workload now hosted in the cloud, Bahrain’s approach offers insights for other nations embarking on their own digital transformations.

Foundations for digital readiness

Bahrain’s decision to diversify its economy and modernize government services dates back to 2008, with the launch of its Economic Vision 2030 strategy. It set the groundwork for economic sustainability through technology-driven innovation. In 2017, the government introduced its Cloud First Policy, which acknowledged cloud computing as a key enabler for digital transformation. Bahrain became the first country in the Middle East and Africa to mandate cloud adoption over traditional on-premise infrastructure.

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, Bahrain launched an economic recovery plan with technology as one of its four focus areas. This helped ensure momentum in the digital-transformation project.

This proactive approach has fostered a regulatory environment that is supportive of investments in AI, machine learning (ML), blockchain, and the Internet of Things (IoT). The Bahrain Economic Development Board and the Information & eGovernment Authority (iGA) have helped establish policies and infrastructure that encourage both public and private-sector cloud adoption.

Cloud-enhanced citizen services

Cloud adoption has perhaps had the greatest impact on improving the quality and efficiency of public services. Moving government workloads to the cloud has enhanced service delivery, increased agility, and reduced operational costs. The Cloud Transformation Program enabled 72 government entities to migrate to the cloud, incorporating more than 1,385 government services and 570 e-services.

The National Bureau of Revenue’s VAT system, for example, now runs on SAP’s HANA cloud database, and the Ministry of Justice has developed a cloud-based management system for legal cases, using a database and applications from Oracle. The Electricity and Water Authority has implemented a smart metering system using IoT sensors for real-time monitoring, and the Ministry of Education has launched the EduNet e-learning platform, which serves more than 140,000 students.

Specific projects, such as the Civil Service Bureau’s Organizational Performance Project, have seen cost reductions of up to 83 percent, while the Ministry of Education’s E-learning Project has reduced costs by 89 percent.

The government also revamped its procurement strategy. Instead of capital expenditures on physical data centers, it has moved to an operational model that optimizes cloud spending. In 2020, Bahrain established the National Cyber Security Center (NCSC) to strengthen digital security.

By using cloud infrastructure, Bahrain has enhanced the security of its services, increased system reliability, and enabled data-driven decisions across government entities. The result is faster, more transparent services that align with citizens’ needs. For example, citizens can now renew documents such as nationality identity cards, passports and driving licenses entirely online. They can track the renewal’s progress and have the new document delivered to their home. This eliminates the need to visit a government office.

Advantages of early cloud adoption

The early adoption of cloud computing has allowed Bahrain to lower IT costs as it has reduced the need for physical infrastructure, which can be expensive to source, maintain, and update. The time needed to prepare infrastructure for a new IT project has been cut to days, rather than months. Operations expenses have been reduced by up to 80 percent, particularly for things like disaster recovery and backup systems. In addition, Bahrain has achieved a carbon emission saving of 81.903 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent (MTCO2e) compared to running data centers locally between February 2022 and December 2024.

It has also accelerated innovation by enabling new applications and services to be deployed faster than before, and it has enhanced security and compliance through partnerships with global cloud providers.

The partnership with AWS marked a pivotal moment for Bahrain’s digital modernization. AWS launched the Bahrain Region in 2019, which enabled Bahraini organizations to store and process data locally and benefit from world-class cloud capabilities. This supported government transformation and attracted foreign investment, tech startups, and larger enterprises that needed a secure, scalable digital environment. For example, iGA launched Bahrain Open Data Portal in August 2023 in collaboration with OpenDataSoft company. The portal published more than 440 data sets by 42 government entities. This supports the government of Bahrain’s commitment toward transparency and e-participation with public users and communities

Bahrain’s 85 percent cloud adoption has accelerated the implementation of new government services, strengthened disaster-recovery capabilities, and improved the efficiency of resource allocation. With scalable infrastructure, departments can adjust capacity based on demand, which prevents system overloads and minimizes downtime.

The economic impact

The significance of Bahrain’s cloud-first strategy is clear. An Economic Impact Study by market intelligence firm IDC projects that cloud services will contribute $1.2 billion to Bahrain’s GDP by 2026, creating more than 9,300 jobs. Investment in public cloud services—those provided by third parties to multiple customers—in Bahrain is projected to grow almost 15 times from 2018 to 2026. This makes it one of the fastest-growing cloud markets in the region.

Cloud adoption has delivered other economic benefits beyond job creation. With lower entry barriers for startups and the provision of scalable computing power, Bahrain has fostered an ecosystem of cloud-based businesses that is steadily expanding. Companies in FinTech, ecommerce, and cybersecurity have particularly benefited because they’ve used cloud technology to scale operations without incurring upfront infrastructure costs.

The government has heavily invested in cloud-training programs to equip the workforce with the skills needed to support future digital transformation. Initiatives such as AWS training partnerships and university cloud innovation centers have helped more than 2,500 IT professionals upskill.

Scaling transformation with a culture of innovation

Bahrain’s digital transformation sets the stage for long-term success.

Its cloud-first transformation is a compelling example for other governments to follow. The essential steps are to establish clear digital transformation policies, such as a cloud-first mandate; build a strong regulatory environment; and invest in cloud infrastructure to enhance security, efficiency, and scalability. It’s also vital to develop a cloud-skilled workforce to support sustainable innovation and partner with leading cloud providers to accelerate adoption and attract investment.

This model demonstrates how governments can harness cloud computing to drive economic growth, enhance public services, and build future-ready societies.