Revealing the next frontier of content

CABSAT, the Middle East and North Africa’s leading specialist event for the satellite, digital media and filmed entertainment industries, reunites the region’s content and broadcast communities once again in its 26th edition. As the first major regional show to take place in-person since the pandemic, CABSAT sparks meaningful, muchneeded dialogue in the broadcast, content and satellite industries.

After close consultation with key stakeholders and listening carefully to the market, CABSAT was moved to October to allow more international participation and to explore exciting synergies with EXPO 2020 Dubai.

CABSAT 2021’s Content Congress engages a cross-section of senior industry stakeholders with up-andcoming influencers on adapting traditional broadcast models, benefits of disruptive thinking and the future of worldwide broadcasting. The Congress tackles the toughest challenges of the industry including survival strategies of smaller OTT players, future of linear TV, capitalising Gen Z’s changing consumption of content and how cinemas adapt to the rise of stay-at-home viewing. CABSAT also explores the impact of artificial intelligence via the ‘4 Cs’ of AI (how AI will understand the citizen, content, context and container (device) used).

Together with Dubai Studio City, CABSAT launches NextGen Content, a new marketplace set to attract content creators and sellers of ready-to-be-released content.

The pandemic ground film and TV production to a halt across the globe, however, the UAE was one of a few global entertainment centres not to have been severely affected, overseeing over $100 million worth of productions in 2020. Majed Al Suwaidi, Managing Director of Dubai Media City, Dubai Studio City and Dubai Production City and Hans Fraikin, Film and Television Commissioner, Abu Dhabi Film Commission, will discuss how this was possible in such a testing time for the industry.

Other regional and international experts include Henry Windridge, Senior Director: Marketing, Digital & Creative, EMEA Pay TV & Global Brands at Discovery, and Madeleine Noland, President, Advanced Television Systems Committee.

Twitter’s Director of Media Partnerships for the Middle East and Africa and Turkey, Kinda Ibrahim is another speaker, alongside UAEbased startup ScriptDoor who will share their success story, while Karim Rabie, ICT Chief Architect, NEC Corporation, Saudi Arabia and Yusuf Al-Butti, Head of Technology and Engineering twofour54 will discuss what 5G and AI will mean for the future of the E&M industry.

Visitors will also hear from Nigerian broadcast experts Aduku Armstrong Idachaba, Director General of the National Broadcasting Commission of Nigeria, Augustus B. Ajibola, Director of the Department of Entertainment and Creative Services, Federal Ministry of Information and Culture in Abuja, and Mo Abudu, CEO of EbonyLife TV, along with other African experts.

In collaboration with GVF and the European Satellite Operators Association, CABSAT 2021’s SATExpo Summit will host leading satellite operators including Nilesat, Arabsat, Eutelsat, Russian Satellite Communications Company, Gazprom Space Systems, Azercosmos and Turkmen Hemrasy.

It will tackle topics including how enhanced satellite communication technologies are helping to fight the spread of COVID-19, what’s next for the UAE’s space exploration as well as ways satellites are impacting maritime, transport and government sectors.

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