Bengaluru, Dec 11 (IANS): About 64 per cent of hybrid cloud users in India now have a formal, organisation-wide policy and approach for the use of Generative AI (GenAI), a new report showed on Monday.

However, Cloud leaders are concerned about the challenges associated with the privacy and confidentiality of data and information when adopting GenAI, according to the report by tech major IBM.

In addition to the ability to unlock the power of generative AI being cited as one of the key benefits of a hybrid cloud approach, leaders agreed that a cloud environment is essential for managing sustainability initiatives at an enterprise level, but workforce deficiencies in cloud skills are impacting implementation.

“As GenAI gains momentum in India, organizations need to harness the power of a robust hybrid cloud approach to tackle challenges that are coming to the forefront. Investing in the right cloud technologies and tools will help businesses tackle increasing security and compliance concerns and deliver on their sustainability goals,” explained Viswanath Ramaswamy, Vice President–Technology, IBM India and South Asia.

“It is heartening to see that about 85% of respondents have said they are creating new job positions to fulfil the need for cloud skills in this Generative AI era,” he added.

In India, 68 per cent of the business leaders, on average, agreed that lack of cloud skills remains a considerable challenge in their digital transformation journeys, which is higher than the global average of 58 per cent, ranking second to only Japan (75 per cent).

Indian organisations are leading the efforts to close the skills gap, followed by those surveyed in the US (80 per cent), the UK (77 per cent), Germany (72 per cent), Spain (72 per cent) and Australia (70 per cent).

As the adoption of GenAI grows, the data processing power required for AI workloads can present new challenges to organisations that are looking to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.

“In fact, 43 per cent of decision-makers surveyed in India agreed that they use cloud to help deploy, track, and manage sustainability goals internally, while 44 per cent say they use cloud to help deploy, track, and manage sustainability goals for third parties,” the report mentioned.