The Association of IT Service Employers — SoDA (Software Development Association Poland) and Microsoft have announced their partnership. 107 Polish IT companies affiliated in SoDA, hiring approximately 12 thousand employees overall, will receive help from Microsoft in the form of educational projects for engineers, as well as technical and business support in the use of cloud solutions provided by Microsoft.
The report ‘Cloud Computing in the Banking Sector in the World, Europe and Poland’ prepared by the Polish Bank Association and Accenture estimates that world revenues from public IT cloud services reached USD 182.5 billion in 2018. It is forecasted that the global cloud services market will be worth USD 492 billion in 2023.
The upwards trend is clearly visible among the customers of the SoDA member companies, which provide services to enterprises in every European country, North American countries, as well as Asia, Australia, and Africa.
‘The agreement with Microsoft opens up the possibility of rapid and global scaling of business, strengthens competences and competitiveness of our companies on the global markets,’ says Konrad Weiske, member of the SoDA management board and CEO of a listed company Spyrosoft S.A. ‘It is also important that the Microsoft data center built in Poland will have a Carbon Free status as our customers pay attention to that,’ adds Konrad Weiske.
‘We are observing a growing trend in the demand for services and a strategy of switching to cloud among the international group of Future Processing customers. The agreement signed by Microsoft and SoDA provides member companies with access to the latest knowledge, which is of great importance for rendering top quality IT services the Polish engineers are famous for around the world,’ says Pawel Pustelnik, managing director in Future Processing.
Microsoft announced a partnership with the Polish National Cloud in May 2020 and declared a comprehensive USD 1 billion investment plan aimed at accelerating innovation and digital transformation for the development of Polish Digital Valley. The foundation of the multi-level investment is the opening of a new Microsoft data centre region in Poland and support for the development of digital competences in Poland.
‘This investment will strongly contribute to the further success of Polish developers through creating opportunities to advance key skills for approximately 150 thousand employees, partners and students. Microsoft Azure is a service that helps both engineers and companies that provide services on the world markets. The first Azure region in Central and Eastern Europe will allow us to maintain the highest cybersecurity standards, meet the requirements associated with data localization in Poland, and ensure compliance with legal regulations, especially in the case of organizations that have specific requirements in the scope of data storage and processing,’ adds Robert Badura, who is responsible at Microsoft for the development of Azure technology on the medium and small business market.
In the study entitled ‘Cloud Computing in Poland 2020’ published by the editors of the IT magazine Computerworld in April 2020, 96% of companies are thinking about using cloud tools and services, and 40% of companies hiring from 501 to 1000 employees have a strategy of transition to cloud solutions. 38% of companies hiring from 1,001 to 2,000 employees are technologically prepared to move to this kind of solution. The most popular cloud provider (according to answers to a multiple choice question) is Microsoft with 31% responses.
Software Development Association Poland is a union of employers operating in the IT sector, whose aim is to exchange knowledge and experiences, as well as to establish commercial collaborations and partnerships. This is achieved by the organization of industry events, networking, and webinars, and also promotional and business support. The organization was established in 2018 and so far has gathered 107 companies involved in software production. The total turnover of the member companies is PLN 1.5 billion. The SoDA member companies hire about 12 thousand employees. They provide software development services to customers in every European country, North American countries as well as Asia, Australia and Africa.
Microsoft provides a platform of solutions that for others are the foundation for development — a better life for citizens, transformation of Polish enterprises, schools, offices and expansion of Polish IT companies — Microsoft Partners — who create their own solutions based on Microsoft technology. The company’s aspiration in Poland is to contribute to the creation of the Polish Digital Valley, where the technology allows for accelerating the development of Polish enterprises and organizations. As a leader in the field of cloud computing, the company constantly creates new cloud services and solutions as well as AI mechanisms that help in the transformation of institutions, enterprises and entire branches of the economy. For over a decade the company has been developing the Azure cloud platform, which is used by 95% of Fortune 500 companies.
