Computer News Middle East May 2017

ISSUE 304 | MAY 2017 WWW.TAHAWULTECH.COM

Dubai Police Data privacy in the Middle East Teradata Universe Al Masah Capital Li-Fi

The

Headhunter Bayt.com co-founder & CTO Akram Assaf on digital disruption and dot-com boom success

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EDITORIAL Our events

Data deluge A 1999 interview with rock legend David Bowie remains a remarkable vindication to those who doubted what the World Wide Web could achieve.

“I don’t think we’ve even seen the tip of the iceberg,” the now-deceased Bowie told BBC journalist Jeremy Paxman. “The potential for what the Internet is going to do to society – both good and bad – is unimaginable. We’re on the cusp of something exhilarating and terrifying.”

I’m going to stick my neck out – hardly as bold as Bowie, mind you – and say that data will be the Internet’s equivalent in the I’m going to stick coming years. my neck out and We’ve got a fascinating selection say that data will of stories this month that really show be the Internet’s just how much data is impacting our equivalent in the lives, as well as its effects – both coming years. extraordinary and frightening.

Glesni Holland explores an issue that the general public hasn’t yet come close to grasping the importance of, and one that I believe will dominate our lives in years to come – data privacy. Glesni looks at laws that currently exist in the region, as well as the potential for privacy abuse from international corporations and governments. Read more on page 34.

Smart Dubai has been on the rampage lately in terms of major technology announcements, and it has taken a huge step in terms of data transparency, with the launch of the Dubai Pulse platform, which will be populated by public and private sector information. More on page 12.

I also had a thought-provoking conversation with Akram Assaf – this month’s cover star and the cofounder and CTO of the region’s leading jobsite, Bayt. com – who gave me some great insight into the ways data is impacting the region’s job market.

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Contents

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ISSUE 304 | MAY 2017

20

BAYT.COM COFOUNDER & CTO AKRAM ASSAF

26

CIO SPOTLIGHT: AL MASAH CAPITAL GROUP CIO

12

Power of the Pulse

16

Data drivers

18

Digital value

Smart Dubai used its Future Now event to launch a landmark data platform and a pledge to be free of paper transactions by 2021.

30

CASE STUDY: ASWAAQ

56

INTERVIEW: INTEX TECHNOLOGIES DIRECTOR KESHAV BANSAL

Glesni Holland explores the vulnerability of personal information, and what regulations are in place to protect citizens.

38 Let there be light

James Dartnell reports from Teradata Universe EMEA 2017 in Nice, France, where the firm conceded it needed to continue to "regain its focus".

Etisalat gathered banking and finance IT leaders to learn how they could maximise the digital transformation opportunities on offer.

24 Robocop

34 What's mine is yours

Dubai Police’s general director of smart services, Khalid Nasser Alrazooqi, explains how Dubai’s citizens will be kept safer with futuristic technology.

With the global Li-Fi market expected to hit $80 billion by 2021, how will this technology compete against its radio waves counterpart?

Is the end nigh for WiFi?

44 Hybrid highway

Is shifting to hybrid cloud environments getting easier, and are Middle Eastern companies considering this as an option for their business?

48 Top of the class

Microsoft Gulf's Necip Ozyucel on why cloud training is more important than ever for IT professionals in the MENA region.

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the

undeniably mobile 51% a tablet

70%

2004

4X

9%

have access to a

smartphone

2015 MOBILE PAYMENT

GROWTH

all 3 devices

14% wearables

44% of consumers said mobile influences 3/4

of their purchases

BUY NOW

omnichannel

catching up to customer demands But what is it?

An integrated experience where customers can research, purchase, pick up and even return transactions across multiple channels - store, online, mobile app, contact centre, catalogue, etc.

50%

of customers expect to buy online and be able to pick up in-store.

The opportunity cost of not being omnichannel is

10% in lost revenue.

modern consumer By 2020, IoT could have the biggest impact on the modern customer experience

digitising

the in-store experience

With technologies accessing smart real-time data in the coud, retailers are delivering an engaging, anyway-you-want-it customer experience that goes beyond the brick and mortar.

Software/customised app store • mobile pos • Wi-Fi • cloud data centre • ibeacon • tablet • identity management • digital signage • kiosk

Top retail technology priorities

70%

55%

53%

51%

47%

36%

mobile

omnichannel integration

advance CRM/loyalty programmes

mobile for associates

mobile engagement for customers

single transaction engine

Source: VMWare / Airwatch

SHORT TAKES

Month in view

IBM, SALESFORCE ANNOUNCE AI-CRM DEAL

IBM and Salesforce have announced a partnership to deliver joint solutions designed to leverage artificial intelligence and enable smarter decision making.

The partnership will see IBM Watson and Salesforce Einstein – the AI behind the firm’s CRM solution – connect to enable customer engagement across sales, service, marketing, commerce and more.

Using IBM Application Integration Suite for Salesforce, customers will be able to able to bring together on-premise enterprise and cloud data with specialised integration products for Salesforce, surfacing that data directly within the Salesforce Intelligent Customer Success Platform.

“This year, we expect Watson will touch one billion people through everything from oncology and retail to tax preparation and cars,” said Ginni Rometty, chairman, president and CEO, IBM. “Now, the power of Watson will serve the millions of Salesforce and Einstein customers and developers to provide an unprecedented understanding of customers.”

“I’m thrilled to form an alliance with IBM – no company’s core values are as close to Salesforce’s as IBM’s,” said Marc Benioff, chairman and CEO, Salesforce. “It’s the best of both worlds.”

The Watson and Einstein integration is expected to be available in the second half of 2017.

8

MAY 2017

SAMSUNG PAY LAUNCHES IN THE UAE Samsung Gulf Electronics has announced the launch of its muchanticipated, flagship mobile payments service, Samsung Pay, in the UAE. Samsung Pay works with Samsung’s patented Magnetic Secure Transmission (MST) technology as well as with Near Field Communication (NFC). MST replicates a card swipe by wirelessly transmitting magnetic waves from the supported Samsung device to a standard card reader. Through MST, Samsung Pay will work on most point of sale terminals in the UAE. According to the company, the UAE is the first country in the Middle East to introduce the service and the 14th in the world. In just under two years since its initial launch, Samsung Pay is now present in 17 countries.

“We are thrilled to introduce Samsung Pay in the Middle East, an innovative new service that we believe will evolve the way people in the UAE carry out their purchases.

With Samsung Pay, we are confident that we are providing customers and merchants a mobile payment service that will pave the way for a cashless society in the UAE,” said Mohammad Gharaibeh, head of enterprise,

Mobile Business at Samsung Gulf Electronics. “Our goal with Samsung Pay is to drive and lead innovation in mobile commerce, providing our customers with a mobile wallet solution that is simple, secure and available almost anywhere. Since the early access introduction of Samsung Pay last year, we have seen great momentum and experienced significant consumer adoption.”

LEVERAGING 5G TO DIGITALISE INDUSTRIES IN THE UAE CAN CAPTURE

$6.5 BILLION IN BUSINESS OPPORTUNITIES BY 2026.

Source: Ericsson www.tahawultech.com

DHA IMPLEMENTS ROBOTIC DISPENSING SYSTEMS IN UAE HOSPITALS

maximum automation with minimal manual input and provide quicker, safer, and more efficient dispensing.

They can help speed up the process to prescribe medicine to patients, and The Dubai Health Authority (DHA) increase accuracy in measuring, leading has officially implemented its robotic to greater patient satisfaction. dispensing systems in both Rashid and “Implementing the Omnicell robotic Dubai Hospitals. dispensing solution is an important The move is aimed at reducing step in significantly decreasing the the public’s waiting period in patient waiting time and increasing the receiving medicines and increasing efficiency of the outpatient pharmacy patient satisfaction. to provide our patients with an excellent The DHA chose to implement healthcare service,” said Dr. Ali Al Omnicell’s Robomat robotic Sayed Hussain, director, Pharmacy dispensing system – consisting of the Department, DHA. “This is in line with Medimat storage and dispensing unit our mission to develop an integrated and the Speedbox filling system. and sustainable healthcare system The systems, according to Omnicell, that helps ensure the delivery of can help hospital pharmacies achieve comprehensive and excellent services.”

EMIRATES NBD INTRODUCES ‘CHEQUE CHAIN’ platform, ensuring that once the cheque is received and cleared under the bank’s ICCS technology, the bank staff will be able to validate the cheque’s authenticity and have access to Abdulla Qassem, group chief operating officer, Emirates NBD its source at all times.

Emirates NBD has launched ‘Cheque Additionally, a string of 20 random Chain,’ an initiative that will integrate characters will be added on the MICR blockchain technology into cheques (Magnetic ink character recognition) to strengthen their authenticity and band of the cheque leaf using nonminimise potential fraud.

MICR ink.

The bank plans to introduce the “Having established our leadership offering to its employees during the in the UAE banking sector in exploring pilot phase, ahead of the customer roll the potential of blockchain, we are later this year. delighted to be the first bank in the The first phase of the initiative will country to utilise this remarkable see the printing of a unique QR (Quick new technology to strengthen and Response) code on every leaf of the upgrade our internal processes,” said newly issued cheque books, thereby Abdulla Qassem, group chief operating reducing fraud by making it difficult to officer, Emirates NBD. “The launch forge cheques. of this initiative is also in line with our In the following stages of the commitment to customers to prevent project, the QR code will register each fraud and ensure the security and cheque on the bank’s blockchain safety of their transactions at all times.” www.tahawultech.com

DUBAI HAS BECOME THE FIRST CITY WORLDWIDE TO HAVE CREATED ITS OWN FONT. DEVELOPED IN PARTNERSHIP WITH MICROSOFT, THE FONT IS AVAILABLE IN 23 LANGUAGES. UBER ANNOUNCES DUBAI AS FIRST FLYING VEHICLE PARTNER CITY

Uber has announced Dubai as one of the first partner cities in its Elevate project, the goal of which is to develop a new on-demand vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) network to enable customers in the future to get high-speed flights in and around cities at the touch of the button.

Dallas-Fort Worth will join Dubai as the first cities in the project, whose partners will include real estate companies, aircraft manufacturers, electric vehicle charger manufacturers as well as the cities. The goal of Uber’s partnerships, in both cities, is to have the first Uber Elevate Network demonstration by 2020.

“Dallas and Dubai are racing to the future and we can’t wait to see how on-demand VTOL flight accelerates these great cities,” Jeff Holden, Uber’s chief product officer said. “Urban Aviation is a natural next step for Uber, which is why we are working to make push a button, get a flight a reality.”

MAY 2017

9

Vintage Tech: HP ThinkJet

T

he birth of commercial inkjet printing can be traced all the way back to 1984, when thermal inkjet technology developed at HP was introduced in a highquality, low-price personal printer known as the ThinkJet. Producing both high quality (192x96dpi) and high speed printing (150 characters per second) resulted in HP dominating the inkjet printing space for the subsequent 10 years. Marketed as “getting along with everyone,” the printer was compatible with “just about any personal computer” on the market at the time.

However, the ThinkJet did have some limitations which inhibited its acceptance and consequently slowed the uptake of inkjet technology.

For starters, it required special paper, which was understandably an inconvenience for the user, as well as being an additional expense. And while the print head wasn’t intended to become worn due to the fact that the head was said to never actually touch the paper - thanks to the ink being sprayed from the head onto the printed document - should you have needed to replace it, they were particularly hard to come by on the market.

Nevertheless, the printer's main selling point was the fact that users were able to “talk on the phone while printing,” as inkjet technology spelled the end for the noisy dot-matrix printer. It also came in a battery-powered version with an HP-IL interface, enabling users with the option to print on the go.

The ThinkJet weighed less than 3.15 kilograms and measured just 30 centimetres in width, making it the ideal size for personal desk use. It was also the smallest printer produced by HP until 1992, when the DeskJet Portable was introduced.

10

MAY 2017

www.tahawultech.com

EVENT

Smart Dubai: Future Now

Power of the Pulse On the backdrop of a series of major announcements, Smart Dubai used its Future Now event to launch a landmark data platform and a pledge to be free of paper transactions in four years’ time.

I

t’s clear that the Government of Dubai has realised the criticality of information in its shift to become a knowledge-based economy.

In its drive to provide a range of enhanced services for its 2.7 million citizens, Smart Dubai’s announcement of the Dubai Pulse platform seemingly represents a statement of intent for collaboration between the public and private sectors.

Announced by His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of the Dubai Executive Council at Dubai Design District, Dubai Pulse will host all of the emirate’s data and form the backbone of its shift towards smart development.

Dubai’s government has instructed all departments to begin populating the platform with their data, with Dubai Police, the Roads and Transport Authority, Dubai Municipality and DEWA already on board.

The platform compiles all data available to both sectors, and will provide access, for the first time, to live and up-to-date data about the city. It includes three layers of 12

MAY 2017

data: the first will be free of charge and caters to the public, while the second offers a thorough analysis of the data – in exchange for a fee – to be used for academic, professional, commercial, and economic purposes.

The third and final layer includes data accessible exclusively to Dubai Government entities.

HH also announced the Smart Dubai 2021 initiative, which sees the government pledge to no longer use paper transactions by that point. The new strategy is also said to centre around building on the infrastructure, legislation, and applications that the Dubai Smart Office and all of its affiliates have built in the last three years.

“Today, in the era of Big Data, it is essential to have a central platform to house all of the government’s data – a platform that taps into the potential of artificial intelligence to spread happiness among people,” Sheikh Hamdan said. “This is the only option for countries that want to remain relevant and build infrastructure that meets the needs of the future.

We are looking to build a truly Smart City – one that will use technology

In the era of Big Data, it is essential to have a central platform to house all of the government’s data.”

HH Sheikh Hamdan bin Rashid Al Maktoum as the key to a balanced and happy life. While we’ve already seen a great shift towards digital government transactions, I believe that the future of government will be entirely paperfree. In 2021, we will celebrate the very last paper transaction in Dubai, and Smart Dubai will see to it that we achieve this mission.” www.tahawultech.com

stakeholders in all sectors across Dubai can find what they need to make informed decisions. The platform compiles all government data in one place, where the right information can be provided for the right people whenever they should need it.

“The value of transformation exists within data, and it will empower decision makers to have a holistic view of the city across industries.

Decisions will be easier and faster

HE Dr. Aisha bint Butti bin Bishr, Director General of the Smart Dubai Office, said that the new strategy marked an important stepping stone in achieving the UAE’s broader longterm ambitions. “Despite what Dubai has already achieved today in terms of smart city development – which is still a distant dream for most cities around the world, including in some of the most advanced countries – we are just getting started,” she said. “We are still at the beginning of a new journey to a www.tahawultech.com

Smart City worthy of the government of the future, the UAE Centennial 2071, and the Mars 2117 project, among other national initiatives.”

HE Younus Al Nasser, assistant director general of the Smart Dubai Office and CEO of the Dubai Data Establishment, said, “Following the launch of the Dubai Data Establishment, the natural progression was the launch of ‘Dubai Pulse’ to act as a digital safe for all of Dubai’s data, so that leaders and

because people will be considering other dimensions.”

Al Nasser added that Smart Dubai will be looking to build out Dubai Pulse in the coming years to enhance its potential. “We will continuously evaluate the platform and which innovations we can introduce,” he said. “There is definitely room for new providers to come on board; a lot of technology can be added from infrastructure and data perspectives.”

MAY 2017

13

EVENT

GCC Petroleum Media Forum

Power in your hands The region’s energy ministers and industry leaders gathered at the third annual GCC Petroleum Media Forum at Abu Dhabi’s Rosewood Hotel, to discuss the ways in which the topic is covered by journalists, and the increasing influence of Big Data and social media.

T

he recent trials and tribulations of the energy industry have been comprehensively documented, not least in a region that is heavily dependent on oil and gas revenues. It’s no secret, however, that these stories are no longer being told in the ways they once were.

Technology has transformed the media industry to the point where 14

MAY 2017

information is passed and markets are shifted at a rate never seen before.

December’s historic OPEC agreement saw members and non-member oil producers commit to cut their combined output by almost 1.8 million barrels per day, and a number of the key figures behind that deal were in attendance at the GCC Petroleum Media Forum’s third outing.

HE Suhail Al Mazrouei, minister of energy for the United Arab Emirates, stressed the importance of investing in new technology to ensure that the oil and gas industry continues to innovate amidst an oil price that has suffered in recent years.

When asked by if the GCC would face heavy job cuts in the face of an increasingly automated industry, Al Mazrouei was cagey. “It depends,” he told CNME. “In the manufacturing industry, it’s easier to say, because of robotics.

However, when you’re dealing with high-pressures and high temperatures as in oil and gas, I think the level of jobs will not be significantly affected. We are trying to expand in creating more of a value chain here in Abu Dhabi, and investing throughout the value chain of the hydrocarbon and petrochemical industries and more derivatives of the petrochemical chain. That’s what we’re trying to do. We think that is going to create more jobs.”

Labelled as a drive for transparency, the UAE’s Ministry of Energy and OPEC have launched a new application for the organisations’ annual statistical www.tahawultech.com

bulletin. OPEC is also set to unveil a Big Data project, aimed at developing a comprehensive tool for analysing publicly available oil and gas data. This will see all industry data from 1960 onwards collated into a free-of-charge public platform.

Keynote speaker HE Dr Sultan Al Jaber, ADNOC CEO and UAE minister of state, meanwhile, discussed the ways in which technology is having an increasingly pervasive influence in the way information is spread. “Information is moving faster than ever before; social media is the fastest way for information and misinformation to be spread,” he said. “It’s important www.tahawultech.com

that we acknowledge the power of social media in order to build trust.

It’s remarkable how easily a tweet can influence opinion.”

OPEC’s secretary general Mohammed Barkindo was the day’s third and most in-depth speaker, and as well as delving into a number of broader issues relating to energy, he too explored how technology is having a deep impact on the sector.

“Despite a period of stagnation, the future is assured for the GCC, and Abu Dhabi has remained at the forefront of technology,” he said.

Barkindo went on to discuss the ways in which the pace at which information is spread is having a deep impact on energy markets.

When you’re dealing with highpressures and temperatures, I don’t think the level of jobs will be significantly affected by automation.

HE Suhail Al Mazrouei, minister of energy, UAE “Nowadays, we have another information outlet that we simply cannot ignore – the face of social media – which continues to expand with each passing year. These are firmly established applications that are having a growing influence on all walks of society.”

MAY 2017

15

EVENT

Teradata Universe EMEA

Data drivers James Dartnell reports from Teradata Universe EMEA 2017 in Nice, France, where the firm conceded it needed to continue its push to ‘regain focus’, as well as embrace Hadoop, cloud and open source to drive customer business outcomes.

I

f Teradata had indeed been asleep at the wheel, it now looks to be living life in the fast lane. A recurrent theme of its Universe EMEA conference in the south of France was an acknowledgement that it had perhaps lost its way in finding a balance between business and technology initiatives, but that things were now back on the right track for 16

MAY 2017

the company who has acknowledged that it needs to stick to its core strengths of software and analytics.

Company president and chief executive Victor Lund conceded that the firm had been in need of a change of direction if it was to remain competitive. “We felt we had lost our focus a bit over the last few years, and were off the pace in a couple of

ways,” he said. “We forgot to move in the ways that customers wanted us to. We had a couple of years that were not bad, but not great by Teradata’s standards. I wanted to put some swagger back into the team. We maybe shied away a bit from Hadoop, cloud and open source but over the past year we’ve moved at lightning speed, reaching a pace of change that we want to keep up forever.”

Having ascended to the CEO role just under a year ago, Lund has made it his mission to reinvigorate the company with an approach that focuses on results, and not just on technology. “Our focus had to be on the customers and what they wanted,” he said. “People are now talking about outcomes and business answers rather than bits and bytes. We’ve spent the last year developing a customer-focused strategy to be business-led. We spent time driving ourselves to understand what customers want around deployment options and analytics. I don’t consider myself a technologist. I consider myself a business user of technology, and I www.tahawultech.com

understand what customers want and how they apply technology.”

The firm has been on a drive to hire business consultants and data scientists over the last year, in a bid to help customers make sense of information and “drive business outcomes”, as well as prioritising its R&D investments in cloud, and acquisitions of open source solutions.

Peter Mikkelsen, executive vice president, international, said the changes that Lund had brought to the table had given the company the shake-up it needed. “As a longtime veteran of Teradata, I can say that the last year has brought more change than the preceding 10 years at the company,” he said. “If we don’t move forward, we move backwards, as our competitors are moving at such a fast rate.”

Teradata’s executive vice president and chief business development officer, Mikael BisgaardBohr, meanwhile, delivered a fascinating take on the ways in which the world’s biggest companies are waking up to the need to put data at the core of their strategies – the kind of opportunity that Teradata is looking to exploit. “Continuous, on-demand services will change the ways that companies will compete,” he said.

“Competitive advantage will come from a company’s ability to deal with data and software. Around 50-60 percent of the car of the future’s value will consist of its devices and data, not the seats and steering wheel.”

Bisgaard-Bohr cited the futuristic approach of US retailer Walmart – who last year posted the world’s largest revenue for a single company, $486 billion – and their work with technology that has set the groundwork for their current success.

“They went all-in on technology in the early 90s,” he said. “They invested in point of sale systems not only for www.tahawultech.com

efficiency, but also for the data. They understood that data would let them understand customer behaviour and selling patterns, and help them to synchronise supply chains.”

Chief technology officer Stephen Brobst explained how Teradata is using an open approach to make its analytics tools smarter. “We’re not building algorithms and neural networks; we’re using open source to do that,” he said. “We’re learning more effectively by automating the testing loop, and are able to work for customers with very large data sets, moving into deep learning and nonlinear relationships in data. Artificial intelligence is an umbrella that covers lots of things. I used to joke that AI was the space of all problems that we don’t know how to solve. As we learn to solve them, we give them names. Deep learning is a more narrow definition around using multiple layered neural networks. AI is a marketing term.”

Teradata used announced the release of its new database license flexibility across hybrid cloud deployments. With portable database licenses, Teradata customers can now have the flexibility to choose, shift, expand, and restructure their hybrid cloud environment by moving licenses between deployment options as their business needs change. The new subscription-based licenses come in four tiers, ranging from a free tier for database development to high-concurrency mixed-workload analytical systems, with new bundled features. All tiers come with the same version of Teradata database software, enabling the movement of workloads across tiers. All tiers also come with database features bundled into the license to allow customers to incorporate technologies and build analytical environments.

The firm also announced an all-memory update to its flagship

Walmart invested in point of sale systems in the 90s not only for efficiency, but also for the data.

Mikael Bisgaard-Bohr, EVP and chief business development officer, Teradata IntelliFlex platform, as well as its new IntelliBase platform. The IntelliFlex upgrades are led by a move to all solid-state drives. Both products are offered on-premises, with IntelliCloud availability also coming soon. Both run the same Teradata database software.

IntelliCloud is a managed cloud offering that provides data and analytic software-as-a-service. It is available with new deployment choices including IntelliFlex, and global public cloud infrastructure from Amazon Web Services and later, from Microsoft Azure.

IntelliFlex, launched in early 2016 and in its third release over the last 12 months, delivers a fabricbased architecture that enables the scaling of processing power and storage to match workload requirements. For entry-level data and analytic needs, Teradata created IntelliBase – a solution capable of delivering a logical data warehouse in a solitary cabinet, with single vendor support.

MAY 2017

17

EVENT

Etisalat: Financial Services Digitalisation

Digital value Banking and finance technology leaders joined Etisalat at the The Ritz-Carlton DIFC to learn how they could make the most of the vast digital transformation opportunities on offer in their industries.

B

anking and finance are being digitalised at a rate that is perhaps faster than any other industry.

Banking services are being shifted to customer’s mobile devices, while Fintech is allowing transactions to be conducted at breakneck speed.

All this results in great complexity for technology decision makers.

Both industries are witnessing a transformation of their internal processes, and unprecedented levels of customer expectation.

Vice president of enterprise sales Ragy Magdy got things underway at the Etisalat: Financial services digitalisation conference

by framing how Etisalat Digital is now positioned to help banking and financial services customers transition to digital platforms and processes. “Everyone is going through transformation,” he said.

“Every business who wants to succeed in their transformation journey needs a strong leader with a clear vision. Our CEO, Saleh Al Abdooli, has that vision. He has shown commitment in onboarding the right people and partners to helping us grow. Our goal is to help you understand how we can help you in your digital transformation.”

Etisalat Digital’s senior vice president Francisco Salcedo

A ninja learns through iteration, emphasising agility and speed and, above all, the ability to manage uncertainty.

18

MAY 2017

discussed how the newly formed organisation within the Etisalat Group will tailor its services to keep clients competitive. “Technology is changing the way we work, engage with customers, think and live,” he said. “We are in a transition period. The next 10 years will determine who will succeed and who will not.

We thought about how we could get the best of both worlds – how we can be the best digital player and retain all the good qualities of a strong telco company. We decided to build a unit within Etisalat to offer end-to-end solutions to our digital customers. Success means phygital. We need to understand the importance of omnichannel transformation, and connecting our customers’ physical touchpoints.”

The audience were then treated to an in-depth presentation from Gartner’s senior executive partner Arnold Gutmann. He highlighted how organisations needed to shift from being “Samurais to ninjas” in terms of their technology strategy. “A samurai takes a linear approach to change, emphasising predictability, accuracy, reliability and stability,” he said. “A ninja www.tahawultech.com

learns through iteration, emphasising agility and speed and, above all, the ability to manage uncertainty.

Leadership is an important ingredient for a successful innovation strategy. You have to be both a Samurai and Ninja.”

He went on to add that many organisations overcomplicate the idea of digital transformation.

“Digital transformation doesn’t have to be rocket science,” he said.

“You don’t have to outthink your competition, it’s enough to just make sure you adopt solutions that fit your market. It’s not just about transforming your organisation. It’s also about how you transform ways to communicate with customers, partners and even competitors.”

Senior director of security solutions Kamran Ahsan discussed www.tahawultech.com

how banking and financial services are especially in need of processes that are as smart as their technologies. “We are living in an IoT age – the Internet of threats,” he said. “The banking and financial services industry is the only sector that’s proactive in learning about the implications of the growing threat landscape. Digital security has become an ecosystem. As custodians of IT and business, we need to learn about the digital security ecosystem.

We know that every company is different. Each BFSI firm is different in their approaches and risk appetites.

That’s why we are focused on offering them the best services that are customised according to their needs.”

Rounding off the day’s presentations was Maha Muraish,

vice president of data monetisation, who discussed the importance of utilising channels to their full effect.

“The most important thing to think about is your customers,” she said.

“You need to understand them – what they need and how they want to get it. It is also important to know about the channels that you are using. The outcome of a service may vary depending on the channel that it is deployed from. Bringing a unique experience and making your customers feel secure are key ingredients for the digital branch.”

Also speaking at the conference were Miguel Angel Villalonga, vice president of cloud and data centre, and Alberto Araque, vice president, digital marketing and Internet of things.

MAY 2017

19

CASE STUDY

Bayt.com co-founder & CTO, Akram Assaf

The headhunter

Since the turn of the Millennium, Bayt.com has organically grown to become the region’s go-to jobs website. Chief technology officer and co-founder Akram Assaf has been at the heart of that transformation, and has guided the company through the dot-com boom and into the age of digital disruption.

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kram Assaf is no stranger to competition. The two primary industries – recruitment and technology – which encapsulate the firm he co-founded and now serves as chief technology officer for, Bayt.com, are defined by it. As millions of people around the world continue to flock to the Middle East – and Forbes’ seventh most influential city in the world 2014, Dubai – in the hope of a better job and life, demand for jobs is intense as ever. Technology, too, is an industry that sees would-be competitors waiting for their moment to pounce.

“In the Internet business, competition is a click or an app away,” Assaf says. “Running a technology platform is an iterative process of refinement, and it’s easy for competition to bring new value, especially when they are able to deliver services that originate from other markets.”

Founded in 2000, Bayt.com has gone on to become firmly established as the go-to regional jobsite. This berth has been hard-earned, with Assaf’s tough negotiating skills and deep understanding of technology being central to the company’s success.

Along with Bayt.com’s three other co-founders, Assaf needed 20

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to be exceptionally persistent and savvy to get the company off the ground amidst the dot-com boom, in a region that lacked the technology infrastructure of other markets. Ensuring Bayt. com survived its early years was a sink-or-swim test of the quartet’s business and technology acumen.

“From 1998-2000, all these Internet companies were coming through and disrupting the way business was done,” Assaf says. “IT design was not simple at the time.

Technologies were emerging, and a lot of them were certainly not primetime for a production environment, never mind being developed enough from an Internet infrastructure point of view.”

The GCC was a particularly testing market to operate in. “If you were a Middle Eastern company, the chances are your traffic was routed to the US or the UK. Not to mention the 9-6 – far from a 24/7 – culture that existed around technology.”

Although these conditions have somewhat evolved since Bayt.com’s early days, Assaf nonetheless casts envious eyes over the conditions that 2017’s digital disruptors now find themselves in. “Startups now have it relatively easy,” he says.

“They can deploy their technology

on an as-a-service model and they are good to go.”

He adds that the regulatory environment also served as a hindrance in accessing the mass market all those years ago. “The biggest advantage of an Internet company is your ability to reach the masses from a centralised location,” he says. “In the US, once a startup was operational they had immediate access to 300 million people. The challenge in this region was the number of jurisdictions, which had to be individually overcome.”

Having worked for Accenture and Oracle prior to co-founding Bayt.com, Assaf was already well-versed in the arts of sealing technology deals that could benefit Bayt.com as an end user. A cut-price hardware agreement with Sun Microsystems helped get the firm off the ground. “They gave us $600,000 worth of hardware for $100,000 initially,” he says. “This helped to give us the platform we needed to build the company up.”

From a business perspective, meanwhile, Assaf and co. realised that there was a huge gap in the market for a jobs website that could help to smooth the recruitment process in the Middle East. “All mediums that were in place were inefficient and required www.tahawultech.com

Running a technology platform is an iterative process of refinement.

too many intermediaries,” he says.

“Traditional recruitment required newspaper adverts, faxes and mail.

It was a fragmented experience, and opportunities were often lost due to companies not finding the right people.”

Fast-forward 17 years, and Bayt. com now finds its technology in a different league from its humble beginnings. The company now has 400 staff on its books, and 13 offices spread across 11 countries, all of which serve to manage the site’s 10 million monthly users.

Bayt.com is “continuously growing”, with the Middle East’s status as a leading emerging market generating increasing demand in recruitment.

“Everyone who leaves a job creates business demand,” Assaf says.

The demands of running a website that is accessed by millions of people mean that the 9-6 IT culture of old is long gone. “We try to set up our architecture with no single points of failure, to ensure our 24/7 operation,” he says. “Of course, www.tahawultech.com

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CASE STUDY

Bayt.com co-founder & CTO, Akram Assaf

this is much easier than said than done.” Assaf adds that Bayt.com is “largely dependent” on open source technologies, and he is under no doubt that this gives the company greater freedom, as well as an ability to differentiate itself from competitors. “It’s important that we let customers define what they want, so we need to be driven by our own business, not vendors,” he says. “If you are dependent on externalities, what’s stopping your competitors from procuring the same thing?”

Cloud computing has been a regular fixture at Bayt.com for some time now. The firm uses “a lot” of applications on a Software-as-aService model, and has been using Infrastructure-as-a-Service since 2007. Assaf continues to drive a hard bargain in terms of hardware procurement, however. “You can easily buy $1 million worth of servers for $70,000 if you’re willing to get it second-hand,” he says. “It makes sense to buy hardware that is in perfectly good condition – and is only 2-3 years old – for huge discounts.”

Assaf thrives off the extra freedom his dual co-founder role affords him, and is an advocate of making bold decisions in technology strategy.

“Decision makers need to have risk appetite,” he says. “If you’re a CIO or CTO and you buy hardware at its full price, and have a low appetite for risk, you won’t get fired. But you won’t add value, because it’s already gone to the vendors. You might fail if you take risks, but that’s business. Not all of my decisions are correct.”

He empathises with technology leaders who don’t enjoy the same autonomy, but believes there are a few steps that can encourage calculated risk. “It’s important to educate a team to be more 22

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If you are dependent on externalities, what’s stopping your competitors from procuring the same thing?

open to experimentation,” he says. “This could even take place outside of business hours, if the organisation gives recognition to such initiatives, and that goes a long way to encourage innovation.

It’s also important to build staff

confidence during less risky projects, and to develop an open, honest communication with the leadership.”

Bayt.com is continually looking to build out its technology platform, and find new ways that it can gain a better understanding of and provide better services for its users. Assaf is fully aware that the ways Bayt. com can use data will prove decisive in the coming years. “We have to analyse the different components of information that we have,” he says.

“Our main sources of data are our employees, the users interacting with the business and the information residing in job descriptions. We need analysis to determine which skills are in demand, and which ones are exiting the market.” www.tahawultech.com

INTERVIEW

Dubai Police

Robocop Following the announcement of the Smart Dubai 2021 strategy and the Dubai Pulse platform – which will host all the emirate’s data – James Dartnell caught up Dubai Police’s general director of smart services, Khalid Nasser Alrazooqi, to hear his thoughts on the changes and how Dubai’s citizens will be kept safer with futuristic technology.

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hat kind of potential do you think there is for Dubai Pulse and Dubai Police to collaborate?

We are sharing a lot of data across the government, and one of the key types of information that we will share is accident location data in Dubai. This allows us to look at the effects of driving on different routes, and how we can provide alternative routes as a solution.

The other aspect that people can now use easily is the Dubai Police application, which provides more than 125 services, which means they don’t need to visit a physical police station anymore. This is a key initiative that we have worked on. The next step is to provide the smart intelligence system. As a customer, we should know what you require before you ask us. This is the next challenge that we are working on.

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We also need to look to provide what we call the ‘artificial police station’ where people can visit police stations and access services without the need to interact with human beings.

How do you think your anticipated use of robots will be impacted by Dubai Pulse, and what progress is being made on their introduction?

As you know, we’re working across different channels, and one of the channels we’re working on is to provide robot police in the city.

You’re going to find robocops soon in the city, providing a different kind of service to the public. Dubai is growing a lot, and we have more than 200 nationalities, so we have to find an alternative way of how we can deal with customers.

Instead of hiring new officers, we can provide robots that can deliver this kind of service.

What other types of crime need to be tackled in the city, and how can Dubai Pulse play a part in providing insight?

People are a part of us, so it’s important that they can report any crime or accident, or any information that could provide additional security to Dubai. The Police Eye component of our app allows you to take any picture, voice or video, and this information can be used with Dubai Pulse to provide new services.

Where have you seen the biggest development in terms of your own technology?

We are looking to provide services across all channels: on kiosk machines, over the Internet, intranet and even in dealing with banks and artificial intelligence. The next step is Blockchain, and we can exchange data www.tahawultech.com

among the government and ease the process of transferring this information in a secure way.

What are your thoughts on the policy of sharing data between public and private sector organisations?

I’m a board member of the Open Data

team, and we’re working very hard to launch this law. We’re determining things such as where you can put all kinds of categories of data, ensuring the data is secure and which data should be available to government and the private sector. This will help the process of exchanging information, not just among the

You’re soon going to find robocops in the city, providing a different kind of service to the public.

government, but even as an investor; if you want to set up a company or shop we can provide all kinds of information that can help you.

What are your thoughts on the use of predictive analytics within Dubai Police?

We’ve actually started working with this kind of tool, that can predict the crime and the location. But unfortunately, it still doesn’t give us high enough accuracy rates. In the US, they’ve also started using similar tools but they’re still not mature enough.

www.tahawultech.com

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CIO

Spotlight

Smooth mover Ashith Piriyattiath has witnessed the impact that IT can have across a variety of industries in the GCC region. Now group head of IT at Al Masah Capital, his ‘greed for technology’ is driving the firm’s investment expansion into new channels.

espite claiming to have “accidentally fallen into the technology industry,” Ashith Piriyattiath’s extensive CV has empowered him with a broad knowledge on the importance of IT across a variety of verticals. Following an initial setback when pursuing his original career path in hotel management, Piriyattiath enrolled on a Bachelors of Computer Science at Mahatma Gandhi University in 1997, before being offered a position at the Indian Institute of Management as a trainee IT professional following his graduation. “IIM is one of the top IT institutions in India, so this was a fantastic opportunity for me so early on in my career,” says Piriyattiath.

He enrolled onto a Masters course at the LBS College of Engineering in 2001, and simultaneously took up part-time employment in the field at E-Com Technologies in India. In 2006, Piriyattiath moved to Muscat to join National Bank of Oman as an associate software developer, before relocating back to India and joining Red Entertainment Distribution – one of the largest games distributors in the region - in 2008.

Having concentrated the majority of his industry experience on the

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business application side of IT, Piriyattiath switched his focus to ERP, and was hired by logistics company Red Orange in 2009. “I was recruited to complete an ERP implementation after numerous failed attempts, and was offered a position as head of IT,” explains Piriyattiath. “I began working across the infrastructure, which was a challenge for me as it was outside of my comfort zone.”

The stakes were high at the firm, as the company was a major supplier to the United States’ military and artillery defence unit. “There were offices spread across Dubai, the GCC and India, but I was also frequently travelling to New York to correspond with our team over there,” he says.

“There was a lot of pressure to bring state-of-the-art infrastructure across all of our bases, coupled with the fact that we had to comply with very strict standards and regulations when working with the military. In a way, this experience was like going back to college; adapting to this corporate culture was a whole new way of learning for me.”

In 2011, Piriyattiath began to apply his technology acumen to yet another industry, when he became Heinz’s IT manager for the Middle East and Africa region. “From an infrastructure perspective, my job was to maintain

and enhance it as best I could as the major technologies were already in place, which made my life much easier than it had been in previous posts,” he quips.

During his time at Heinz, Piriyattiath was reporting to both the global CIO and regional CFO under a dual reporting role. He primarily focused his tenure at the company on enhancing ERP systems, but also overcame a number of challenges surrounding robotics and business intelligence within supply chain management. The position also saw Piriyattiath take his first trip to the UK, which would become a bi-monthly ritual. However, following the $28 billion acquisition of Heinz by Berkshire Hathaway in 2013, Piriyattiath opted to leave.

“A completely new management team was brought in, and all of the strategies we’d worked on changed, so I had to go,” he says.

His next step – joining Aspen Pharma Care as IT manager of the EMENAC region – was a particular achievement for Piriyattiath on both a personal and professional level. “When I joined in 2014, Aspen was undergoing a major global migration of the IT infrastructure into this region, which involved transferring all of the ERP and business intelligence systems across www.cnmeonline.com

“

Previously, our private equity firms were just concerned about the running of the business; no one gave a second thought to IT security.”

from the global office in Mauritius,” he explains. Between travelling to Johannesburg, Cape Town, Mauritius and Ireland – where Aspen’s IT head office was stationed – the project was completed within a year. However, despite successfully decoupling the IT department from the global office, Piriyattiath didn’t stop there.

“The Baan ERP system that we were using was around 20 years old, and there was resistance from management to move ERP systems before or after the migration,” he says. “That being said, one of my biggest achievements at the firm and in my career to date was initiating a roadmap to transfer Aspen’s IT systems across to SAP, and the company is now in the process of implementing SAP across the organisation. The progress we made at Aspen is my baby.”

Piriyattiath moved to his current post as group head of IT at Al Masah Capital in January 2016 following his one-and-a-half-year stint at Aspen. The investment firm oversees four verticals: asset management, real estate, corporate advice and private equity, and all except one private equity firm’s IT delegates answer to Piriyattiath.

A major challenge upon his posting was to enhance the IT security across the firm’s corporate offices and private www.cnmeonline.com

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CIO

Spotlight

entities, following prior incidents of data breaches across the business.

“Before I arrived at the company, there were a few incidents where large sums of money were lost, particularly through email spoofing,” he explains.

“Previously, our private equity firms were just concerned about the running of the business; no one gave a second thought to IT security.”

Piriyattiath has since implemented a data leak protection system, based upon an infrastructure that he claims “could compete with the top banks in the region” with regards to IT security.

“When I first joined Al Masah Capital, I started restricting employees’ access, and the initial bout of feedback I got from my staff was that ‘the police had arrived,” he says. “I’m not a person that says no to everything, but I know that my team and I can add real value if the correct processes are put in place within the business.”

With corporate offices in DIFC, Jumeirah Lakes Towers and Abu Dhabi, Piriyattiath must ensure that any project he instigates aligns with the regulatory guidelines put in place by the Dubai Financial Services

“

I’m not someone that says no to everything, but I know that my team and I can add real value if the correct processes are put in place within the business.”

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Association (DFSA) and DIFC data laws. “If I say no to a proposal from my staff, I always try to offer an alternative solution that properly aligns with DIFC and DFSA guidelines,” he says.

Aside from this, he has implemented his own internal regulations with regard to information security within the company. This is following an incident before he joined, where an ex-employee lost their laptop on holiday, and the firm’s IT department was not advanced enough at the time to remotely wipe it or protect any of its files.

“At my first meeting with my CEO, he told me that he wanted to replace all laptops with desktops, to prevent this from happening again,” he says.

Instead, Piriyattiath compromised.

Laptops at Al Masah Capital are now physically locked to the employees’ desk, and a request has to be made to the IT department if a member of staff wishes to move it. The laptop’s activity is then heavily monitored by Piriyattiath and his team.

“I explained my CEO that instead of replacing 200-plus laptops and incurring that expense, we could find a solution to this problem that would ensure security but also flexibility,” he says.

Piriyattiath’s longstanding “greed for technology” has been the driver behind these transformational directives, and his ambitions are showing no signs of slowing down anytime soon. “I am always looking for ways to involve any new technology trends in my business,” he admits.

One of his main focuses for the remainder of 2017 sits with Al Najah Education – the education division under Al Masah Capital, where he hopes to implement a cheaper and alternative solution to RFID scanning, which would enable the school to track both its students as well as its assets.

TIMELINE 1997

moves to muscat to join national bank of oman

2011

joins aspen pharma care

2016

Graduates from Mahatma Gandhi University

2006

joins heinz as regional it manager

2014

Named al masah capital group cio

www.cnmeonline.com

CASE STUDY

Aswaaq

Supermarket sweep In a bid to keep up with an increasingly demanding retail industry, Aswaaq’s IT director, Manoj Vijayan, led the implementation of an indoor positioning system that can locate items on a customer’s shopping list to within a 30-centimetre accuracy.

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aving established itself in 13 locations across Dubai since the brand’s inception in 2008, Aswaaq now prides itself as being “one of the most trusted retailers in the UAE.” The homegrown brand operates both supermarkets and small-tomedium-sized shopping malls across the emirate, in addition to a variety of other services.

Striving to remain at the heart of residential communities, each of the branded malls is complemented with a tailor-made assortment of shops to meet the demands of the local neighbourhood. Enhancing the customer experience of shoppers is a critical mantra for any retail outlet, and in order to ensure the brand remains one step ahead of its competitors, IT director Manoj Vijayan believes technology has a huge importance in accelerating this progression.

“Technology plays a vital role in giving us an edge towards the ever30

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changing, dynamic market trends that surround us in the retail industry,” he says. “This means that any solution we plan to implement must be seamlessly integrated, with endto-end capabilities.”

In line with this, Vijayan recently opted to implement an indoor positioning system using visual light communication (VLC) technology across Aswaaq’s outlets. www.tahawultech.com

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CASE STUDY

Aswaaq

Through this new system, customers can use their smartphones to access location-based services via the transmission of data through a flicker of light. This flicker is imperceptible to the human eye, but can be detected by the customer’s smartphone camera.

“Once our customers have downloaded the retailer’s app, they can choose to access these locationbased services across the store, which gives them the ability to locate items on their shopping list to an accuracy of 30 centimetres,” explains Vijayan. “The data stream is also a one-way transmission, meaning no personal data can be collected from the lighting system.”

First and foremost, this process has the potential to drastically reduce the amount of time customers spend shopping – particularly if the store is unfamiliar to them. The ability to create a tailor-made shopping list on the app itself and then track the location of these items with 80 percent accuracy allows customers to efficiently navigate themselves around the store, taking the shortest route possible.

According to Vijayan, the experiment of the indoor positioning system using VLC technology was the first in the region, and only the second in the world. “This meant that it took some time for the feasibility study to be completed, and further time to formalise the scope which ultimately empowers our customers and staff on the shop floor,” he says.

“Coordinating with multiple solution providers of different time zones across the globe to enable our internal subject matter experts also extended this implementation process.”

However, since the integration of the technology, Aswaaq has seen a range of benefits to both customer experiences and the business’s bottom line. “The project has certainly improved our brand value, and customers seem to really appreciate the pragmatic approach we have taken 32

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The project has certainly improved our brand value, and customers seem to really appreciate the pragmatic approach we have taken to empower them.

to empower them,” says Vijayan.

“This positive feedback has not only enhanced our customer loyalty, but has also excelled our turnover.”

Aswaaq has started implementing LED lights across its stores to coordinate the technology, as well as striving towards operating in a sustainable and eco-friendly environment. Vijayan also believes that businesses in the retail industry must continue to innovate in line with evolving technology demands if they are to remain competitive players. In addition to the VLC implementation, Aswaaq has installed a sales transaction kiosk concept called “no cash, no credit card, no mobile,” which simply uses biometrics to carry out transactions.

This acceleration in evolving technology is also mounting pressure on retailers, as it has a huge influence on the expectations of customers when they carry out their supermarket visits. “Customers now expect to see an interactive and engaging model on the shop floor, instant promotions delivered directly to them, with quick queue-busting options to avoid delays during the checkout process,” says

Vijayan. “Aside from this, online shoppers also expect there to be a quick turnaround in receiving their orders, in addition to having click-andcollect delivery options available.”

But with e-commerce being the regional hot topic of 2017 to date, will the likes of Aswaaq and other traditional supermarkets be outmuscled by companies such as Amazon who continue to introduce services to transform the industry?

Vijayan believes otherwise.

“Brick and mortar is always going to be there, as long as retailers are innovative and address the human factors involved in the shopping experience,” he says. “Moreover, even if 90 percent of customers go online, retailers still need a huge picking fleet with various main and satellite facilities, as well as a base to set up an effective delivery model to serve ‘click-andcollect’ customers timely and efficiently.”

Even the big players in the market, such as Amazon, that began their journey online are reverting to setting up a physical presence through the likes of ‘Amazon Go’ outlets that have recently opened in the US. Looking ahead, Vijayan intends to develop a variety of digital channels within Aswaaq’s infrastructure to encourage further business benefits. “In order to be a market leader, you really have to adopt business transformation initiatives through digitalisation,” he says. “We have created a digital transformation department and developed an interactive digital ecosystem to address the entire digital environment to support both customers and employees.”

Aswaaq has initiated a number of projects relating to this hot topic, and Vijayan hopes to continue moving towards the same revenue model that has been applied in current projects, such as the VLC system implementation. “Any digital touch point will soon be a sales channel at Aswaaq,” he says. www.tahawultech.com

“Once you install the system and implement the solution, it‘s ON and that‘s it.”

- Mr. Ramesh Ramakrishnan, Head of IT, Middle East Zurich International Life

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FEATURE

Data privacy

A recent McKinsey report claims that the global exchange of data and information now generates more economic value than the global goods trade.

Glesni Holland explores how this remarkable finding impacts on the vulnerability of personal information, and what regulations are in place to protect citizens.

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www.tahawultech.com

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t’s time to confess. At some point, all of us claim to have read – and have subsequently agreed to – excessively long lists of terms and conditions when signing up to an online service. Does it even occur to you to open these lists, let alone give them any of your time?

Diligent online users – who, let’s face it, are few and far between – might not be so quick to drag their cursors over that ‘agree’ box.

However, the recent overturning of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) ruling in the United States, which now allows ISPs to monetise user data, has prompted Internet users worldwide to question the whereabouts of their personal details when they submit their data to an online service.

The ruling indicates that ISPs would like to do what Google, not covered by the new FCC rules, is already doing: selling anonymised profiles – based on data that companies gather – to third parties for ad targeting. But while the average citizen cannot begin to

comprehend the amount of data that Google collects, it can only track you across the sites that it owns or has contributed code to. What is more concerning is that ISPs can track your entire Internet-browsing history.

“What you’re seeing in the FCC’s change of policy is a philosophical shift that aligns with the current US administration,” says Eamon Holley, legal director, DLA Piper. “In other words, letting free market economics regulate things rather than requiring government intervention.”

Europe, on the other hand, has a fundamentally different attitude to data protection, and the recent launch of the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) means that there is less expectation of such a broadbrush approach to data privacy across the continent.

Here in the Middle East, things don’t seem to be quite so clear-cut, and what appears to be lacking is a uniformed approach to the matter across the GCC. In the UAE, there is no general federal data protection law

Even though there isn’t a dedicated, comprehensive data protection law in many countries in the region, regulations in other countries are raising the compliance bar.

Eamon Holley, legal director, DLA Piper www.tahawultech.com

comparable to those applicable in Europe, as there is also no single national regulator. Instead, the UAE has provisions in place within its respective general laws, such as the Penal Code that makes the publishing of private information a criminal offence, and the Privacy of Consumer Information Policy, initiated by the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (TRA), that requires a licensee to obtain consumer consent before sharing their data.

“Even though there isn’t a dedicated, comprehensive data protection law in many countries in the region, regulations in other countries are raising the compliance bar to a degree anyway,” adds Holley.

However, Nicolai Solling, chief technology officer, Help AG, believes this isn’t enough. “Given the complexity of the digital age that we are in, safety and privacy of data can only be guaranteed through the implementation of unified data protection laws,” he says.

In Dubai, certain areas are more regulated than others. For example, Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) is unique in that under the terms of the UAE’s Federal Law No. 8 of 2004, it is recognised as an independent jurisdiction within the country, and is therefore empowered to create its own legal and regulatory framework for both civil and commercial affairs.

The DIFC Data Protection Law is designed to balance the legitimate needs of businesses and organisations to process personal information while upholding an individual’s right to privacy. “As a large number of entities operating in DIFC work with data that is very sensitive in nature, the application of data protection laws seems natural,” MAY 2017

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Data privacy

Solling adds. “It would, of course, be encouraging to see these laws find their way out of these zones, as privacy concerns are not just limited to these confinements.”

There are a number of factors that could contribute to the lack of data protection frameworks outside of certain areas in Dubai, but the cost of implementation, setting up a new regulator and staffing it to actively enforce laws remain key inhibitors.

“It may be that the government’s position on this matter is that what is in place now is sufficient,” says Holley.

“But as we’re being engulfed by the data tsunami, this thinking appears to be changing.”

Elsewhere in the region, Qatar has recently rolled out the first country-wide data protection law in the GCC, which requires companies to protect the personal information that they gather from customers, or face stiff penalties.

There is said to be scope for this framework to be replicated across other GCC countries, although there is no timeframe in mind for when this may be. “Its not uncommon for there to be a ‘domino effect’ around the region with new initiatives, including legislative developments,” says Holley.

A primary concern around the unchartered sharing of data is users’ lack of education and awareness around the fact that it is happening.

“What about the number of times you have to hand over a passport copy or credit card copy to a non-governmental organisation?” asks Solling. “How do they store this important information?

Who has access to it? How, if ever, is the data discarded?”

While handing over a passport at a hotel for check-in purposes satisfies a reasonable level of expectation, why has it become the norm for an Emirates ID card to be left at the security desk of buildings across the UAE, if this card is supposed to be in 36

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What about the number of times you have to hand over a passport copy or credit card copy to a nongovernmental organisation?

Nicolai Solling, chief technology officer, Help AG

your possession at all times?

In terms of the protection of data online on a more global scale – particularly through social media outlets – a recent experiment emphasised the policy reading behaviour of online users. The study assessed the extent to which individuals ignore privacy policies and terms of service when they signed up to a fictitious social networking site, NameDrop. Results revealed that 399 of the 543 participants skipped all of the fine print entirely and instead just clicked ‘quick join.’ For the remaining 144, the average time spent “reading” the privacy policy was 73 seconds, and for the terms of service, 51 seconds.

Implications were revealed after 98 percent of respondents missed the ‘gotcha clauses’ about data sharing with the NSA, and about providing a first-born child as payment for access to the site.

Likewise, many would undoubtedly have a shock if they read the privacy policies of active social media sites, and discovered how a complete spectrum of personal information – including who you’ve been chatting with – can be shared

across a variety of platforms, thanks to that tick of the ‘accept’ box.

Take Instagram, for example.

Its terms of service total 17 pages in length and earlier this year a UKbased lawyer re-wrote the terms in child-friendly language to try and encourage users to take note.

“Having critical user-related data collection or usage policies presented in simple, quick-to-read format would help understanding what the user actually signs up for,” says Kalle Bjorn, director, systems engineering, Fortinet Middle East.

The Instagram terms read, “Although you are responsible for the information you put on Instagram, we may keep, use and share your personal information with companies connected with Instagram. This information includes your name, email address, school, where you live, pictures, phone number, your likes and dislikes, where you go, who your friends are, how often you use Instagram, and any other personal information we find such as your birthday or who you are chatting with, including in private messages.”

What’s yours truly is theirs. www.tahawultech.com

FEATURE

Li-Fi

E R H E T B T E E L H G T I L With the global Li-Fi market expected to hit $80 billion by 2021, how will this technology compete against its radio waves counterpart? Is the end nigh for Wi-Fi?

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www.tahawultech.com

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very year, we consume approximately 60 percent more wireless data as the number of connected devices continues to rise. The exponential growth of mobile devices – which Ericsson predicts will hit 6.1 billion globally by 2020 – will undoubtedly impact the offloading of data from cellular networks, and create an intensified bandwidth battle across wireless networks if they remain as they are. This inevitable spectrum crunch is resulting in Wi-Fi providers feeling the pressure of their own success.

Due to the fact that we have become so accustomed to this Internet-driven, online lifestyle, a shortage of wireless capacity and decline in speed and connectivity may seem an alarming thought.

However, we need not worry, as there is a new kid on the block that has the potential to relieve these issues by making use of what we already have: light.

Li-Fi, meaning light fidelity, can be used in connected devices in the home, driverless cars and street lights, among others. It uses offthe-shelf LED light bulbs to enable a wireless Internet connection, and can deliver much greater speeds than standard Wi-Fi. This is primarily due to the fact that the visible light spectrum has a bandwidth potential 10,000 times that of the traditional radio frequency spectrum that Wi-Fi operates on, with the ability to transmit data at a speed of 224 GB per second.

In short, data is fed into an LED light bulb equipped with signal processing technology; the data is then embedded in a beam and sent to www.tahawultech.com

The existing lighting infrastructure of an office can be repurposed to provide Internet access that is energy efficient, and isn’t vulnerable to interference from other wireless networks.”

Alistair Banham, CEO, pureLiFi a photo detector at rapid speeds, and the tiny changes in the rapid dimming of LED bulbs are then converted by the ‘receiver’ into electrical signal.

This signal is then converted back into a binary data stream to a web, video or audio application that runs on an Internet-enabled device.

The reality of this connectivity at the flick of a switch is slowly gathering momentum through the pioneering start-ups that initiated it in the first place. pureLiFi, a UKbased company, is one of the main players in this field. The term was actually coined by the company’s cofounder and CSO, Professor Harald Haas, when he demonstrated the technology for the first time at a TED talk in 2011.

At Mobile World Congress last year, pureLiFi revealed the world’s first Li-Fi USB dongle, known as Li-Fi-X. The credit-card-sized dongle contains a photoreceptor

that receives a signal from a LiFi-enabled light, and an infrared transmitter to send data back. This year, the company went one better and demonstrated an integrated Li-Fi luminaire, which integrates the modulation components into a black ring designed to encircle an LED light. The ring then lays flush with the ceiling and makes Li-Fi-enabled LEDs virtually indistinguishable from regular lights.

The adoption of Li-Fi technology can be a valuable addition to a business, believes Alistair Banham, CEO, pureLiFi. “In an office environment, Li-Fi can offer high speed, bidirectional and fully networked wireless communications that can provide significantly enhanced data density, user rates and security,” he says. “The existing lighting infrastructure of an office can be repurposed to also provide Internet access that is energy MAY 2017

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FEATURE

Li-Fi

efficient and isn’t vulnerable to interference from other wireless networks.”

While it may already sound like a done deal, there are some considerations that businesses should make before rolling out this technology. The inability of light to penetrate walls and extend the wireless connection beyond the room containing the Li-Fi enabled LED could be seen as a disadvantage, as it would mean every room in a house or office environment would need a Li-Fi lighting fixture.

However, pureLiFi spins this as a major selling point of the technology, as it enables a much more secure transfer of data across the light spectrum compared to the radio frequency spectrum. “Li-Fi is significantly more secure than other wireless technologies, because light can be contained in a physical space, and we can create the conditions that allow us to shut the door on our wireless data,” adds Banham.

Since the technology’s official inception in 2011, further companies have taken a shine to the idea and have looked to exploit it as a viable alternative to using radio frequencies.

In the Middle East, Marc Fleschen, CEO of Zero.1, has been a particular driver of Li-Fi implementations.

“Zero.1 is committed to bringing Li-Fi to life in this region, by providing experimental solutions to the public across industrial, commercial, leisure and home environments,” he says.

“We have created a platform of Li-Fi enabled LEDs with our Intelligent Outdoor Tower Automation product range, together with our City.1 software, which takes the traditional LED street light and enables 40

MAY 2017

Our platform takes the traditional LED street light and enables communication through SMS and VOIP, as well as connecting people through motion detection and geolocalisation services.

Marc Fleschen, CEO, Zero.1 communication through SMS and VOIP. In addition, this can connect people through motion detection and geo-localisation services, which allow users to benefit from on-the-spot location information.”

Through Zero.1’s partnership with telecom provider du, the pair initiated the first Li-Fi demonstration of its kind in the Middle East. The duo are also set to roll out a range of solutions which will provide a variety of analytics, communication and management systems, and customer engagement solutions across the emirate. Outside of the Middle East, Singapore’s Infocomm Media Development Authority made an announcement that part of the Li-Fi spectrum will be allocated as licenseexempt, to enable Li-Fi industry trials. “pureLiFi is working with companies

globally to provide solutions and proof of concept evaluations for unique use cases,” added Banham.

“We would now like to see the type of support seen in Singapore replicated worldwide.”

According to a report by Research and Markets, the global Li-Fi market is expected to hit $80 billion by 2021. There is certainly scope for this technology to take off in nations where governments are focused on improving communication and Internet penetration, and the UAE is a prime example of following this initiative. The vast bandwidth of light and its limited exposure to radiation place Li-Fi as a perfect alternative to traditional Wi-Fi networks, and we can be sure to see demand for this technology to increase exponentially in the coming years www.tahawultech.com

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INTERVIEW

Keshav Bansal

A gentleman’s game Keshav Bansal specialises in two of the UAE’s most loved things: smartphones and cricket.

The director of Intex Technologies and owner of Indian Premier League club Gujarat Lions told CNME his thoughts on the world’s burgeoning smartphone business, how technology is impacting the IPL and how Indian demonetisation is causing a rise in digital payments.

T

he United Arab Emirates is surely a place close to Keshav Bansal’s heart. In turn, a nation with the one of the world’s highest smartphone penetrations, and a large South Asian population who adore cricket, is sure to have some affection and admiration towards the 26-year-old owner of smartphone and IT accessory firm Intex Technologies, also the owner of Indian Premier League side Gujarat Lions.

Founded in 1996, Intex Technologies currently has over 11,000 employees, and annual revenues of $928 million, while the Gujarat Lions joined the IPL in 2016 as replacements for Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, who were both suspended for two seasons due to alleged illegal betting by their respective owners.

Young entrepreneur Bansal has high hopes for both his businesses, and firmly believes they will be mutually beneficial to one another. “I implement my learnings from Intex in the management of Gujarat Lions,” he says.

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“We believe that the Indian Premier League is a masterstroke strategy that will further help the Intex brand become a household name and further cement our connection with the youth population. It really is a success story in the making, with last year’s positive track record as evidence.”

Bansal has equally high ambitions for Intex to make its mark in the Middle East. “We have outperformed all other players in import shipments and local manufacturing combined,” he says.

“Dubai is a strong market for us, as my uncle Sanjay Bansal helps in the business. Intex Technologies is looking for a major expansion in increasing its footprint abroad and is exploring the Middle East market to export products.”

As well as his own business interests in technology, Bansal is also an advocate of increased technology adoption in sport. He believes that the right policies and tools can serve to delivering fairer results on the field, and greater insight off it. “Technology in cricket has come a long way, and

there are many noticeable benefits that have come to the fore via this enviable combination,” he says. “Sport is now monitored, results analysed in fractions of a second and future strategies determined on the basis of technology through the use of key data.” He also believes the commoditisation of certain technology makes competition itself more interesting. “It creates a level playing field, as technology now gives access to all investors to fairly assess performance and plan game situations for forward-looking execution,” he says.

Major political developments in India meanwhile, have had a disruptive influence on the country’s technology industry. On 8th November 2016, the Indian government, in an attempt to nullify the country’s black markets, took the measure of demonetising all 500 and 1,000 rupee notes across the country. While the long-term effects of the change remain to be seen, the move has already caused economic chaos and even the deaths of dozens of people who queued for banks. www.tahawultech.com

Sport is now monitored, results analysed in fractions of a second and future strategies determined on the basis of technology.

Bansal concedes that the changes did cause upheaval for the device business in the short term. “The initial period of demonetisation did lead to a country-wide dip in mobile handsets sales - especially for smartphones, since most feature phones and budget smartphones are purchased in cash,” he says. “Now that consumers are better acquainted with digital payments and e-transactions, the fall in smartphones sales has started to recover and is seeing an uptick.”

Over 90 percent of Intex’s portfolio are now 4G-Volte smartphones, and the firm is set to enter the enter the $150-$250 smartphone segment from this quarter. This, as well as improving market conditions, give Bansal reason to be optimistic. “The industry trend in 2017 promises to be an upward and cheerful one,” he says. “The good news is that close to 70 percent of the mobile market in India remains untapped, giving enough space to all Indian and international mobile brands to position themselves.

Mobile handset manufacturing was estimated to be an $8 billion industry in 2016-17 and is expected to grow to $15 billion this fiscal year.”

Following the Indian government’s decision to remove the notes from the market, digital payment apps saw growth of over 150 percent, and Bansal believes that this is prompting a shift from device manufacturers. “Handset players are now preparing to introduce www.tahawultech.com

4G-VoLTE feature phones that will enable a digital drive in rural India where features phones still rule,” he says.

“This cashless drive has fuelled the demand for our products, as people are openly adopting mobile banking and digital payment services as well as telcos’ apps, UPI and unstructured supplementary service data. Moreover, there has been no de-growth in the feature phone market in the country and with 4G coming into play, feature phones will further strengthen by moving towards smart feature phones, in even the smallest of Indian cities.”

He adds that the government’s decision is also serving to boost its own technological ambitions. “The industry has also become the right platform in driving the government’s major initiatives – Make in India, Digital India and Skill India,” he says. “These employ over 40,000 people across across the country, and this is no small feat for one industry alone.”

Meanwhile, Intex is also looking to diversify its business in the consumer

electronics space, having recently expanded its air conditioner business, alongside its LED TVs portfolio.

“We will have a renewed focus on expanding our consumer durables portfolio,” he says. “Foraying into air conditioners was the next natural step to complete our bouquet of offerings, after introducing a plethora of products like direct-cooling refrigerators, smart LED TVs, fully-auto washing machines and air purifiers.”

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FEATURE

Hybrid cloud

HYBRID HIGHWAY Is shifting to hybrid cloud environments getting easier, and are Middle Eastern companies considering this as an option for their business?

T

here’s no doubting that to many Middle Eastern enterprises, hybrid cloud may seem a distant dream. For them, optimisation, not digitalisation, is the reality in the short-term. Those who have already moved various workloads into the cloud, however, are coming to learn that hybrid may be the way to go.

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According to MarketsandMarkets, the hybrid cloud market in the Middle East and Africa region is expected to experience huge growth in the coming five years due to improved application functionality and enhanced technologies. The MEA region is expected to grow from a $2.13 billion market in 2016 to $6.69 billion by 2021, at a CAGR of 25.8

percent, with Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the UAE expected to be the fastestgrowing countries adopting hybrid cloud solutions and services.

For regional organisations with an increasing complexity of applications and workloads, moving aggressively towards a hybrid cloud deployment may seem like the most logical option. As the needs www.tahawultech.com

of various applications differ, the benefits of hybrid cloud are worth associated migration complexities.

“Organisations look to hybrid cloud providers because not all clouds are created equally, and certain workloads may run better on one cloud than another,” says Michael Winterson, managing director, Equinix Services, Europe, Middle East and Africa.

He adds that growing data centre traffic will go hand in hand with hybrid cloud deployments.

“Enterprises in the Middle East are looking for a data centre that is distributed across multiple environments - both on-premise and in the cloud,” he says. “According to the Cisco Global Cloud Index (2015-2020), in the Middle East and Africa, cloud data centre traffic will grow 4.4-fold by 2020 to reach 304 exabytes per year, at a CAGR of 34 percent from 2015 to 2020. By 2020, 95 percent of all workloads in the Middle East and Africa will be processed in the cloud, compared to 78 percent in 2015.”

Amazon Web Services’ Michael Needham, head of solutions architecture for Russia, Middle East, and Africa, believes that hybrid cloud is an almost mandatory step in dealing with increasing IT complexity.

“For most organisations with onpremise technology investments, operating in a hybrid architecture is a necessary part of cloud adoption,” he says. “We understand migrating legacy IT systems takes time. As this is the case, we are seeing great opportunities in the Middle East when it comes to cloud and customers building hybrid architectures.”

As the pace of technology uptake continues to increase in the www.tahawultech.com

Organisations look to hybrid cloud providers because not all clouds are created equally, and certain workloads may run better on one cloud than another.

Michael Winterson, managing director, Equinix Services, Europe, Middle East and Africa GCC, the region yet again has the advantage of being able to watch peer companies in more developed markets take the plunge with newer ICT strategies. Hybrid cloud is a prime example of a model that may appear riddled with risk when first considered by more conservative regional CIOs, but one that is nonetheless increasingly appealing in a region whose appetite for success is ever whetted. But the question remains: is it ultimately fair to benchmark the GCC region against more developed markets?

Data sovereignty will continue to be an ongoing issue for many companies in the region, and will deter those who operate in certain industries, while many will always be wary of the lack of local on-theground support.

Winterson believes that leading European economies are already setting an example in terms of adoption rates and willingness to change. “Hybrid cloud is driving public cloud adoption and is the catalyst for much of European enterprises’

digital transformation,” he says. “A CIO Research survey showed that over half of CIOs and IT managers in France, Germany and the UK identified hybrid cloud as their most common cloud adoption model.”

A key factor in an increasing desire to shift to hybrid cloud has been the advancement of a number of tools that can make a series of complex processes much more manageable. Winterson believes that recent developments have made CIOs’ lives much easier in this respect. “Over the past few years, we have seen more turnkey solutions and management tools coming onto the market to help organisations take greater advantage of hybrid cloud,” he says. He adds that widespread virtualisation adoption and sounder governance have played an important role. “These technologies range from the creation of policies for data transfer to deploying virtual machines, managing storage capacity and configuring networks.”

Despite the benefits of hybrid MAY 2017

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FEATURE

Hybrid cloud

cloud, a region dominated by SMEs may be asking itself if there is a place for it within roadmaps.

Adrian Pickering, Red Hat’s regional head of the Middle East and North Africa region, believes that, for now at least, hybrid cloud is suited to bigger players. “Candidly, our view on cloud is that the vast majority of large organisations such as banks or ministries are highly unlikely to move all of their applications to the public cloud,” he says. “It is far more likely – and in our experience in developed markets – that a hybrid cloud setup is the most pragmatic and cost-effective approach for larger businesses.”

He goes on to add that there is a growing interest in the region across the board. “According to IDC, between 20-25 percent of regional CIO’s are planning to implement

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It is far more likely that a hybrid cloud setup is the most pragmatic and cost-effective approach for larger businesses.

Adrian Pickering, regional head, Middle East and North Africa, Red Hat hybrid cloud at this time,” he says.

“CIO’s are faced with specific considerations in the Middle East region, especially relating to data sovereignty, however, there is

significant interest, and as end-user confidence develops in regional cloud solution providers, then we expect an acceleration in hybrid cloud adoption.”

www.tahawultech.com

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INTERVIEW

Microsoft Azure training

Top of the class Necip Ozyucel, cloud and enterprise business group lead, Microsoft Gulf, tells CNME why he believes cloud training is now more important than ever for IT professionals in the Middle East and North Africa region.

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www.tahawultech.com

H

ow can Microsoft Azure training make IT professionals more valuable to their organisation?

If you think about supply and demand, in terms of the latter, our customers want more digital transformation. If you look at digital transformation from the outside, it’s about how we can help our customers engage with their clients in better ways. Then, it’s about how we can help them create more efficiency for their employees. Next, it’s a case of how we can optimise their processes, and help them change their business models or products.

We recently announced a business analytics deployment for Majid Al Futtaim which allows them to harness their data and drive future actions, and that’s an example of this success.

Digital transformation is something of a survival game. If you look at the S&P 500 in 1960, the average age of its companies was 60-years-old. The average age in 2017 is just 12. Startups are coming and disturbing incumbents; companies need to change to avoid becoming obsolete. They are using digital transformation to become more agile, control costs and launch new products, and change their business models before someone disrupts them.

In terms of supply, cloud is the main change driver.

If you think about Azure, we have 38 regions, and each one has more than one data centre, and can accommodate up to 12. There are one million miles of our fibers between these data centres, with a total of 120,000 new customers every month. With such an opportunity, whether you’re a startup or an enterprise, there’s no barrier in terms of IT. You can start small and scale up as business grows. On top of the fundamentals of cloud, we are now offering advanced technologies such as artificial intelligence, internet of things and machine learning.

For example, we are also deploying projects for facial recognition to www.tahawultech.com

Understanding cloud from left to right is key for digital transformation to save cost and increase agility and innovation.

understand customer satisfaction levels after an interaction, as well as chatbots for 24/7 service.

There is demand for digital transformation and supply in terms of cloud, but we need someone to use these technologies. This is the role of IT professionals and decision makers. We are trying to enable them with these tools to use for the sake of digitally transforming their companies and products.

Almost all IT professionals use Microsoft services or products so are already familiar with us, but in the last year we have added more than 600 new tools and features to Azure. Cloud is a new topic and is growing rapidly, so catching up is not easy. That’s why we’re investing in Azure Skills and readiness opportunities, to enable IT decision makers to use cloud.

How can this kind of training help IT professionals to enhance their own careers?

We have similar tools, including Microsoft Virtual Academy, Mechanics and Channel 9, which are videos that summarise the benefits of technologies. We also have 2-4 month face-to-face training courses through our learning partners, while Azure Skills is a massive open online course (MOOC), which sits between that. Those are online, 16-24-hour,

self-based training courses. We have 18 different courses, which are both hands on and theoretical. There are courses for developing applications, keeping your identity safe and infrastructure services on Azure. Those are the training courses that we ask our IT professionals to complete.

Post-training, we provide certificates of completion, and they can also take official Microsoft exams to complement those.

Is the lack of cloud skills the biggest inhibitor for widespread adoption in the Middle East and North Africa region?

It seems so. In a 2016 Gartner study, CIOs indicated that the number one barrier for advancing their business in terms of IT was IT skills. There are other studies that show that cloud skills make IT professionals more employable.

Cloud is new but is improving very rapidly in terms of technologies, because there are no major releases.

We launched Windows 8 and Vista as separate versions. For Azure, there are no version changes; it keeps evolving with new functionalities and scenarios.

There is a gap in terms of cloud skills, which is only increasing.

Why is cloud training now more important than ever?

Cloud is the biggest enabler, and other trends such as social, mobility and Big Data are fuelling one another. For example, in terms of data, there are 10 zettabytes of data in existence, but by 2020, that number will have risen to 50. If we have cloud platforms, more mobile devices connect, and more data can be collected. Understanding cloud from left to right is key for digital transformation to save cost and increase agility and innovation.

Certifications and training are the key things in terms of companies hiring talent. Improving IT professionals is very important for them to improve their earning potential and play an important role as change agents.

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EVENT

GISEC 2017

Prepare and protect With the region’s cybersecurity market set to be worth $22.14 billion by 2022, Dubai World Trade Centre is gearing up to host its 2017 edition of Gulf Information Security Expo and Conference (GISEC) 2017.

C

ybersecurity experts from across the region and globe will discuss, debate and highlight the latest Smart City technologies and service innovations at the Gulf Information Security Expo and Conference (GISEC) – the Middle East’s largest cybersecurity event – which will run concurrently with the Internet of Things Expo (IoTx) from 21st-23rd May at Dubai World Trade Centre (DWTC).

With an increasing number of cybercrimes and cyberattacks on regional government entities and private organisations, GISEC 2017 will shine its spotlight on the need for MENA-based public and private companies operating across industries to establish solid cybersecurity frameworks. The Middle East cybersecurity market is projected to be worth $22.14 billion by 2022, according to a MarketsandMarkets report.

The pressing regional need for enhanced cybercrime-related support infrastructure and further investment in cyber-defence solutions has seen GISEC attract strategic government50

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level support from major entities.

Chief among them are Smart Dubai, Dubai Police and the recently-formed National Cybersecurity Centre for the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, which is responsible for shaping cybersecurity policy and spend in the region’s largest consumer market. A further 70 delegations from regional government departments responsible for cybersecurity and technology spend are confirmed to attend the events.

“As Dubai and regional cities pursue their ambitions to become Smart Cities that are more interconnected, cybersecurity issues have become a critical consideration, which require greater vigilance,” said Trixie LohMirmand, senior vice president, exhibitions and events management, DWTC. “GISEC brings together world-leading figures and visionaries under one roof to discuss the best way forward to tackle various www.tahawultech.com

GISEC brings together worldleading figures and visionaries under one roof to discuss the best way forward to tackle various threats.

threats. Crucially, this year’s event has attracted strategic governmentlevel support from a cross-section of the region’s largest ICT, smart tech and cybersecurity spenders – we are anticipating three days of insightful knowledge sharing, networking and deal-making.”

GISEC 2017 will host more than 500 international delegates and www.tahawultech.com

75-plus high-profile speakers from entities including GCHQ – the United Kingdom’s Government Communications Headquarters – the United States Cyber Consequences Unit, HSBC, EasyJet, Wells Fargo and GSK among others. More than 6,000 visitors are expected across the three-day events.

In addition to sharing international best practices required to address the growing concern of cyber-attacks and the rising number of high-profile hackings, GISEC 2017 will also debut an all-new ‘Startup Pavilion’, where more than 50 start-ups, based or incubated in the UAE, will feature their latest cutting-edge products and solutions.

Representatives from several startups will also be given the floor during

a dedicated session at the GISEC Conference, where they will pitch their concepts direct to the audience.

On a macro level, the GISEC Conference will explore opportunities, challenges and market needs across the regional cybersecurity sector.

Specific focus topics will include the protection of critical fintech infrastructure, transportation, cyber investments and Big Data.

Powered by GITEX Technology Week, GISEC 2017 is strictly open to the security and intelligence community, including government departments, business and enterprise. Visitor attendance to the exhibition halls is free of charge, although attendees must purchase tickets to attend the events’ conferences. For more information, please visit www.gisec.ae.

MAY 2017

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ADVERTORIAL

ON THE CUSP OF CHANGE Abraham Mammen, head of VC, Middle East and North Africa, Logitech, explores how businesses can easily transform their meeting rooms to be ready for modern video conferencing.

Abraham Mammen Head of VC - Middle East & North Africa

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www.cnmeonline.com

I

n an era of massive digital transformation, UC&C – unified communications and collaboration – is one of the key digital workplace initiatives to accelerate employee engagement, speed up communications and enhance decision making at scale. Video conferencing, as one its component technologies, promises rich and agile collaboration within the business. Is this a technological nirvana? In reality, the adoption of video conferencing has faced challenges.

Traditional codec-based video conferencing systems, typically limited to a handful of meeting rooms due to their cost and complexity, have played an important role in making the technology mainstream over the last 20 years. However, businesses with these legacy systems are considering how to scale conferencing technologies to meet the demands of their connected workforce.

Frost & Sullivan estimates that over 96 percent of meeting rooms globally are equipped with projectors or displays, and old-world audio communications. In other words, only 4 percent of meeting rooms globally are equipped for modern video conferencing.

The price tag associated with traditional video conferencing systems has meant that global deployment has not been affordable for most companies. The good news is that technology has since moved on, and PC-based conferencing systems with cloud software provide a robust, scalable collaboration infrastructure that businesses can afford to deploy.

The last, and arguably, most important challenge faced has been with user adoption. Many employees used the specialist systems only occasionally. As a result, they didn’t know how to use the technology, or relied on IT support to make the conferences work. Neither of these scenarios is good for adoption; expensive equipment sits unused in large meeting rooms while employees seek out smaller, ad-hoc meeting spaces.

The state of modern meetings An explosion in open workspaces is changing the way employees work and collaborate. At the same time, the rise of huddle rooms, combined with video-friendly millennials in the workplace, has driven an increase in demand for video collaboration.

Wainhouse Research has reported that the rise of huddle rooms will play a critical role in enabling collaboration among

teams. Company partner and senior analyst Andrew Davis believes there are somewhere between 30-50 million of these spaces worldwide, and most lack the support needed for collaborative technologies.

In parallel, studies indicate that most professionals spend 60 hours per month, or 40 percent of work time, in meetings. Only half of this time is considered productive or effective.

Businesses therefore face an interesting dilemma: how to enable collaboration on-demand for their employees, while ensuring their time in more meetings is spent productively. Simpler solutions for conference rooms are on the rise. Complex, legacy systems are being replaced by affordable conference room add-on devices like those provided by Logitech Group.

Skype room systems change the status quo Microsoft, with its Skype for Business platform, recognised the challenges organisations face in scaling video to every meeting room – cost, management, and user experience among them – and last year launched Skype Room System (SRS) with a goal of transforming every meeting room into a rich collaboration space.

SRS makes it possible to upgrade the meeting experience without having to rip and replace existing AV equipment such as the audio, display or projector in the meeting room. With prices starting at around $2,000, deploying video to every meeting space can now be a costeffective proposition.

Microsoft’s research indicates that a typical video call could take 8-10 minutes to get started.

SRS places a strong emphasis on design and usability, enabling ‘one-touch join’ to the meeting by simply starting your scheduled meeting from the touch-enabled SP4 screen.

The SRS itself is a bundled package including a Surface Pro 4 (SP4) tablet (providing the compute platform and a touch user interface), and a dedicated version of Skype for Business optimised for use in a meeting room environment.

The SRS bundle forms part of an ecosystem of SRSapproved audio and video peripherals from Microsoft’s technology partners, including Logitech.

Logitech’s SmartDock for Skype Room System is a mechanical docking station that essentially transforms an SP4 into a meeting room touch panel.

For more information: www.logitech/smartdock www.cnmeonline.com

MAY 2017

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INSIGHT

Yasser Zeineldin, CEO, eHosting DataFort

7 tips for an effective DR plan Yasser Zeineldin, eHosting DataFort, analyses the most important aspects of an effective disaster recovery plan, in order for enterprises to best prepare for a damaging scenario.

T

he sinking of the RMS Titanic on her maiden voyage is one of the most famous disasters of recent centuries. Recent investigations have isolated the low grade of iron used to make the more than 3 million rivets that held the Titanic together as a significant contributing factor to the disaster. Ultimately, despite being an engineering marvel of its time, the Titanic was undone by one of the smallest and seemingly most inconsequential of its components.

The tragedy of the Titanic serves to remind us that a good disaster recovery plan ought to go beyond anticipation of the likely sources of disruption. Some of the ways in which an enterprise can prepare for failure include:

1

Planning for the least possible disruption of communication: A methodology that allows the enterprise to maintain basic communication between departments is a must. In order to best prepare for an extreme event, an enterprise must have pre-identified alternatives to standard methods of communication and coordination, which can operate outside the realm of business as usual scenarios.

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2

Clearly identified performance parameters: Specific variations in work culture and hierarchy must be considered for the enterprise to operate well enough to recover - who is to perform what function, in the event of disruption; which individuals and departments are most critical to the containment of an event, and which functions are the priority areas to address.

3

Clearly identified roles for individuals and departments: There needs to be well-rehearsed and clearly defined alternative roles – for individuals and departments – in the event of disruption.

It is always possible to have alternative functions in place to best utilise the resources of the enterprise during an emergency.

4

Established practices and service agreements: While the affected organisation itself is likely to act in its best interests, several outside entities – from clients to collaborators – are affected by a disaster. A well devised plan needs to be put in place to limit the damage to such entities.

5

Protecting sensitive information central to the business: Every enterprise has operational information that can harm the organisation should it fall into the wrong hands. An effective disaster recovery plan should identify worst case scenarios that could cause such repercussions and the most optimal ways to minimise such damage.

6

Regular testing of emergency procedures for effectiveness: If the elements that need to come together to minimise damage are not sufficiently prepared for, even the best devised disaster recovery plan can prove to be ineffective the contingency plan.

Regular testing and refamiliarisation with the disaster recovery plan is a must so that the disaster can be negotiated with minimal damage.

7

Robust redundancy of procedures, process, entities and infrastructure: Redundancy not only limits the range and scale of the disruption, it also reduces the chance for a disruptive disaster. While isolating functions and departments is counter intuitive and not desirable, redundancy allows for separation of these elements so that the disaster can be minimised and contained. www.tahawultech.com

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PRODUCTS

PRODUCT OF THE MONTH

Launches and releases

Brand: Sony Product: Xperia XZ Premium

Brand: Samsung Product: DeX Samsung has announced DeX alongside the launch of its Samsung Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+.

The device lets users connect their Galaxy S8/S8+ to a monitor, keyboard and mouse for a desktop experience enabling them to seamlessly access apps, edit documents, browse the web, watch videos, reply to messages and more, directly from the smartphone on a larger display.

The base of the Samsung DeX features two USB 2.0, HDMI, Ethernet and USB Type-C ports. Users can set it up as a workstation, with a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse and connected to a monitor via HDMI. It is equipped with an Android UI optimised for use with a keyboard and mouse including multiple-resizable windows, contextual menus and a desktop version Web browser with Samsung Internet.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: According to Samsung, the device is enterprise-ready as it supports solutions such as Citrix Receiver, VMware Horizon Client and Amazon WorkSpaces.

It is also built with smartphone and data protection feature Samsung Knox.

56

MAY 2017

The Xperia XZ Premium is Sony’s latest smartphone offering. It is a 5.5-inch 4K device that’s made with Corning Gorilla Glass 5 on the front and back of the handset. The top and bottom edges of the device have a carefully crafted diamond cut. Certified with IP65/68, the Xperia XZ Premium is protected against water spills and dust.

It is equipped with Android 7.0 Nougat and the Xperia user interface.

The device is powered by a Snapdragon 835 processor, 4GB of RAM and 64GB of internal storage, which can be expanded by up to 2TB by MicroSD card.

The new Qualcomm chip is equipped with an LTE modem, the Snapdragon X16, which enables the XZ Premium to have download speeds of up to 1GB per second.

The Xperia XZ Premim supports high-res audio with its stereo speakers,

which are located on the front of the device. It is also equipped with LDAC technology, which prevents loss of quality when the device is connected to wireless loudspeakers or headphones.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Xperia XZ Premium features Sony’s new Motion Eye camera system that offers the ‘world’s first’ 960 fps super slow motion video capture and playback, four times slower than any other smartphone.

Brand: Synology Product: DS1517+ and DS1817+ Synology has launched DiskStation DS1517+ and DS1817+, two ‘powerful and scalable’ 5-bay and 8-bay tower servers.

According to the company, these new servers offer a high-performance, reliable, and versatile network-attached storage solution for tech enthusiasts SMEs. Both devices are equipped with a PCIe slot, which allows users to install an optional 10GbE network interface card or Synology’s new M2D17 M.2 SATA SSD adapter. In addition, DS1517+ and DS1817+ both come in 2GB and 8GB memory configurations, which can be upgraded to 16GB with with their accessible memory compartments.

DS1517+

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW: Both DS1517+ and DS1817+ are capable of connecting up to two DX517 expansion units, allowing users to add up to 10 additional drive bays and scale up storage capacity on-the-fly. Both devices are powered by DiskStation Manager (DSM) 6.1 operating system for Synology NAS devices.

www.tahawultech.com

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Access to latest events

Search using the Browse chronologically key name, calendar or map

COLUMN

Glesni Holland, Deputy Editor, CNME

Sign of the times I

t’s been a busy month for Emirates NBD. Not only has the bank launched its latest blockchain platform, Cheque Chain (see page 9) but it has also revealed that it will be the first bank worldwide to roll out sign-language technology across its UAE branches before the year is out.

This latest announcement falls in line with the #MyCommunity initiative, launched by His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Chairman of Dubai Executive Council in 2013, that aims to transform Dubai to a disabilityfriendly city by 2020.

Customers with hearing or speech impairments can communicate their banking inquiries to the device using KinTrans technology, which will then be instantly converted into 58

MAY 2017

text displayed on a screen for service ambassadors to read.

But while this is obviously a fantastic use of innovative technology for the greater good of Dubai’s disabled residents, just how prominent is this community of people with hearing difficulties?

A Med-El study in 2015 revealed that hearing loss in the Middle East is an underestimated health issue, and reported that at least 1 in 25 people in the region are affected by some degree of hearing difficulty. What’s more, according to 87 percent of the region’s leading specialists, hearing loss is one of the top five severe health issues affecting people in this region, alongside obesity, diabetes and hepatitis.

While there is no data specifically related to the UAE available at this stage surrounding the number of

deaf people in the country, there does appear to be a common consensus felt by speech and language campaigners that there is a significant lack of sign language translators. This, in turn, has meant those with partial hearing often struggling to make themselves understood in hospitals, police stations and government offices.

Emirates NBD seems to be leading by example in empowering its disabled customers to access its services at ease. In addition to this latest announcement, the bank has nine disabled-friendly branches across Dubai, and earlier this year began distributing braille currency for its customers with visual impairments.

I, for one, hope to see this proactive attitude replicated across other major corporations in the region before too long. www.tahawultech.com

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