Cloud Computing in the Palestinian Public Sector, Opportunities and Challenges

Cloud Computing is considered as one of the most important topics in the information technology in the recent few years. All Information Technology services are available wherever and whenever they are needed. Instead of owning hardware and software which require installation, maintenance and configuration, Cloud Computing offers the usage of Cloud applications and infrastructures based on pay per usage model. The Palestinian public sector needs to know the possibility of adopting Cloud Computing in its operations. It also needs to know the objectives, benefits and concerns of Cloud Computing adoption. Therefore the primary purposes of this study are to assess the possibility of Cloud Computing adoption in the Palestinian public sector in addition to identify all potential opportunities and challenges for switching from existing computing arrangements to Cloud Computing. This study used both the quantitative and qualitative research. The quantitative research included using questionnaires and the qualitative research through the semi-structured interviews to validate findings of the questionnaires. A questionnaire was distributed to the IT staff in the Palestinian public sector, a total of 152 questionnaires were collected and analyzed by SPSS program for statistical analysis. Then, eleven semi-structure interviews were conducted with experts from the Palestinian public sector and were analyzed using Thematic Analysis. On the basis of the results of this research, it can be concluded that the Palestinian public sector is not ready to adopt Cloud Computing in its operations due to the lack of top management support, awareness of the objectives and benefits of Cloud Computing adoption, infrastructure’s support and experience of IT human resources. This study identified the most important opportunities that can be gained by the Palestinian public sector from the adoption of Cloud Computing. In addition, it identified the most important challenges that may hamper Cloud Computing adoption in the Palestinian public sector. Moreover, the study recommended the Palestinian public sector with preparing a future plan to adopt Cloud Computing in its operations which is an attractive technological and economic option in addition to preparing plans to eliminate any obstacle that may hinder the use of Cloud Computing technology.