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Dubai / WAM
Dubai World Trade Centre ( DWTC ) has enhanced its expansive Information Communications Technology (ICT) portfolio by collecting four specialised industry trade platforms under the collective banner of the all-new Future Technology Week.
Future Technology Week, which runs March 29-31 across four halls at DWTC, will collect and showcase various ‘pipeline technologies’ and services featured within Gulf Information Security Expo & Conference (GISEC), the Internet of Things Expo (IoTX), The Big Data Show and Gulf Enterprise Mobility Exhibition & Conference (GEMEC).
“The umbrella Future Technology Week brand has been conceived to deliver heightened cross-pollination across its four components’ complimentary ICT audiences,” said Trixie LohMirmand, Senior Vice President, Exhibitions & Events, DWTC . “The collective platform is lean in terms of the segmented focuses of its inner parts and also robust in the sense that the sum of these parts offer content-rich experiences for visitors whilst facilitating a greater return on investment for exhibitors.”
The consolidation of the four events comes with the IT market in the UAE alone estimated at close to AED 17 billion in 2015 – up from AED12 billion in 2010 – according to the Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The Chamber predicts that value may swell to AED22 billion by 2019, with per capita spending expected to exceed AED2,000 by 2018.
Furthermore, the GCC’s IT services sector – excluding the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia – is predicted to grow 8.64 per cent annually to reach a US$7.9 billion valuation by 2020. In the UAE, the IT services market was valued at over $3 billion in 2014 and is expected to grow to more than $5 billion by 2019 on-the-back of ongoing invest in e-government services, IT hardware for education and Smart City initiatives.
“The three-day Future Technology Week schedule has been carefully designed to ensure its individual exhibitions and conferences each garner their respective share of visitors’ attentions, while also providing an industry-wide overview of expert opinion, innovative technologies and pioneering services in each ICT segment,” added LohMirmand.
“By uniting four existing platforms under the Future Technology Week banner, we anticipate the enhanced educational offering to be particularly attractive to developers, programmers and enterprise architects, as well as government departments, major international blue-chips and thousands of SMEs exploring the next generation of pipeline technologies to boost their fledgling businesses.”
Supported by Dubai Smart Office as Smart City Partner, Future Technology Week will drive awareness of Dubai’s Smart City initiative by providing a collaborative public and private sector platform to facilitate IoT-led innovation in areas including security, data and mobility.
“Collectively, we have arrived at an extraordinary juncture where Dubai’s geographic advantage, economic outlook, resident diversity and access to best-of-breed innovators can be leveraged to transform the city into a benchmark for the world’s emerging economies” said Dr. Aisha Bin Bishr, Director General of Dubai Smart Office.”
Future Technology Week is an opportunity for these industry leaders and decision makers from all sectors to exchange experiences and forge collaborative partnerships towards realising the vision of Sheikh Mohammad bin Rashid to embrace technology innovation to make Dubai the happiest city on earth.”
At Future Technology Week, interactive features taking place for the first time ever in the UAE include a live on-stage Hack by AECert and a one-day code-cracking Capture The Flag Competition where developers, engineers and code breaking enthusiasts will vie for cash and other prizes.
The exhibition is also launching The HIVE, a new innovative technology platform where participants present their ideas to a panel of judges with the aim of accelerating their product development and boosting the MENA entrepreneurship ecosystem. In addition, qualification through certified training sessions for I.T. professionals will take place for the entire week.
As part of Future Technology Week, IoTX opens on March 29 and concludes on March 30, the one-day GEMEC runs on March 29, GISEC opens on March 30 and ends on March 31, and the one-day The Big Data Show runs on March 31. Meanwhile, the exhibition segment runs for three days from March 29 to 31.