Dubai, UAE, Oct. 21, 2015: At a press roundtable held on Tuesday as part of the on-going GITEX 2015 event, Cisco and IT solutions company Gulf Business Machine (GBM) executives outlined the vital key steps that organisations in the Middle East will have to implement in order to become fully digital to embrace the Internet of Things (IoT) era.
Cisco also unveiled its Country Digital Acceleration (CDA) strategy for the region, under which it said it was committed to a long-term partnership with national leadership, industry and academia to deliver real outcomes faster and more effectively. It aimed to accelerate the national digitisation agenda to grow GDP, create new jobs and invest in a sustainable innovation ecosystem across public and private sectors.
Paul Black of IDC, Hani Nofal of GBM and Rabih Dabboussi of Cisco speaking on Digital Acceleration to the media.
At the core of the strategy are 5 key components for successful digitalisation:
1. Education: Creating a better educated workforce, in the latest technologies and practices such as the Internet of Everything, capable of driving digital transformation.
2. Encouraging entrepreneurship: Cisco will work with internal, national and international venture capital entities to provide multi-stage funding for global technologies. The company has already announced a US $6 million investment in the Baida Impact Fund in Jordan to support early stage online and mobile innovation, healthcare technologies and services, e-commerce, consumer Internet and digital media services in Jordan. This funding represents the first allocation from the $10 million venture capital investment commitment, initially outlined by Cisco in May 2011, targeted at small businesses that provide innovative products, services and solutions.
3. Facilitating Innovation: Cisco holds 19,000 patents, 7,000 of which are for software innovation. 25,000 engineers, US $6.3 billion R&D.
4. Public and Private Partnerships: Through Cisco’s CDA partnership, new and established businesses will gain access and export opportunities to markets worldwide through Cisco’s global distribution channels.
5. Infrastructure: Build an infrastructure that gives citizens access to the finest healthcare, city services, education, entertainment and many other areas – all in a highly secure environment.
Some vital stats
• 1 in 4 leaders globally say they are being sufficiently proactive about digitisation and nearly 4 of the top 10 incumbents in each industry will be displaced by digital disruption within the next five years. (Cisco Digital Vortex: 941 leaders)
• 32 per cent of UAE enterprises are planning major/significant investment in IoT over the next 3 years ( IDC EMEA Enterprise Communications Survey, 2015)
• 48 per cent of Saudi enterprises are planning major/significant investment in IoT over the next 3 years (IDC EMEA Enterprise Communications Survey, 2015)
Today, Cisco is involved in over Smart City/ IoT/IoE projects worldwide, including in the UAE:
– Dubai Design District – advisory and consultancy-led services as well as a Data Virtualisation Platform for the d3 smart city project. As part of the award, Cisco will provide an ICT Master Plan for the district and also build a Cisco Smart and Connected City Infrastructure Management layer.
– Department of Economic Development (DED) – ‘24/7,’ an innovative round-the-clock service point developed on the Cisco Remote Expert for Government Services (REGS) platform, in line with the Dubai Smart Government initiatives.
– Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) – upgraded technology infrastructure to support future expansion plans in line with Dubai Smart City goals which included migration of its Al Qussais and Jebel Ali data center network. Cisco Advanced Services conducted an audit at the end of the project to certify the implementation.
– Du – the first telecom company in the world to deploy Cisco’s Application Centric Infrastructure (ACI), to cope with the growing demand for IT application and hosting and cloud services.
– Etisalat –entered into a strategic agreement with Cisco for the supply, delivery and implementation of a Cisco Virtualization and Software Defined Networking (SDN) Proof of Concept in Etisalat’s network to help shape their SDN and virtualisation strategy and future business needs.
Rabih Dabboussi, General Manager, Cisco UAE, said, “As we move into an era of complete digitisation we need to rethink how we approach national infrastructure on a grand scale. Digitisation has the potential to create sustainable and positive impact for every area of society. At its core, Country Digitisation is the process of planning, and ultimately building, a sophisticated and forward-thinking IT network ecosystem that will allow for greater connectivity, productivity and security to drive this positive impact.”
Hani Nofal, Vice President, Intelligent Network Solutions, GBM, added, ” Safeguarding organizational operations in light of evolving digitisation and the growth of IoT will allow our clients continued growth. Security must be a foundational enabler for IoT. While there has been progress and greater awareness, globally, there needs to be increased consensus as our partnership with Cisco demonstrates. The future is digital and we must ensure that the correct security measures are in place in order for government entities, organizations and the general public to feel safe in the technologies that can provide added value to their working and personal lives.”
Image Credit: GBM/CISCO