Cloud platform services (IaaS/PaaS) market size in Japan 2018-2024

The domestic cloud platform services market in Japan, which comprised of Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) and Platform as a Service (PaaS), was estimated at 850 billion Japanese yen in 2020. The source pointed out that developments such as a shift toward remote work and the establishment of more flexible system environments capable of accommodating the digital transformation contributed to the estimated growth during that year.

The cloud market in Japan

The domestic cloud platform services (IaaS/PaaS) market was expected to grow at a two-digit compound annual growth rate (CAGR) from 2018 to 2024, reaching a size of 1.74 trillion yen by 2024. An increasing demand related to the digital transformation as well as an increasing adoption by the public sector were said to contribute to this. A survey among Japanese companies showed that a majority of business enterprises were already using cloud computing to varying degrees. The same survey furthermore revealed that cloud services were utilized for a variety of different purposes, with file storage and data sharing topping the ranking of the most popular types of cloud computing services. A breakdown of the utilization rate of cloud services by capital size indicated that utilization was much more common among larger companies.

Japan’s digital strategy

The Japanese IT industry has come more and more into focus as digitization has increasingly impacted the economy and people’s private lives in recent years. While Japan is known for its advanced technology, it has also been said to exhibit sluggish behavior regarding digital transformation processes. In the recent years, the government introduced a number of initiatives which aimed at improving Japan’s position in the digital age. In 2016, the Council for Science, Technology and Innovation (CSTI), which is part of the Cabinet Office, introduced the concept of “Society 5.0” in its Fifth Science and Technology Basic Plan, which delineated a society in which cyberspace and the physical world are increasingly connected with each other. The realization of Society 5.0 and the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games led to increased efforts to improve Japan’s cyber security strategy and to prevent cyber crimes. For all these projects, solutions offered by the IT industry are necessary, providing ample market opportunities for companies engaged in the IT business.