Public Sector Investments Help Boost UAE’s ICT Sector, Says Executive Director Of Dubai Internet City

The ICT sector in the region, particularly in the UAE, has demonstrated resilience to weather the current economic storm thanks to strong government backing, public sector investment, and higher oil prices, according to Malek Al Malek, Executive Director, Dubai Internet City.

Al Malek’s comments came as part of his keynote address at the IDC’s IT Managers Forum and Expo 2009. Titled ‘Making IT Matter: Finding Opportunities and Defining Values’. The event at Atlantis – The Palm in Dubai witnessed the region’s most influential industry experts showcasing ways on becoming a smart IT buyer under current economic conditions.

Al Malek said: “In spite of budget cuts, organizations in the region have been impacted by the global economic downturn in some measure. While the region has also become a destination for global ICT business consolidation and expansion, decision makers also need to fully realize the integral component that the role of the CIO and the IT team play in the overall business strategy model.”

In his speech, Al Malek noted even though the UAE’s ICT sector fared relatively well, the global recession still increased the risk of IT projects failing. He mentioned that according to the Standish Group report, nearly one in four IT projects had either been cancelled before completion or had been delivered but never used. Al Malek also highlighted the challenges IT projects are currently experiencing in the difficult period namely delayed completion dates, cost overrun and implementation of fewer features and functions than planned.

He added: “The downturn has made organizations significantly more cautious in IT spending and implementation to the point where their vigilance has to some extent, adversely affected project success rates.

“Having said this, I am pleased to see the milestone progress in the UAE’s readiness to facilitate and promote business. As marked by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) report, the country’s infrastructure, connectivity and government support, the UAE continues to improve its global rankings as still the top scoring country for e-readiness in the Middle East and African region.”

Al Malek also noted the EIU report commending the UAE government for its sound ICT strategies as initiatives and programmes are launched and ready for implementation. At the same time, he expressed his confidence with the report’s conclusion that there will be continual development in the ICT sector amidst the global recession.

As the region’s leading managed ICT cluster, Dubai Internet City has to date registered more business partners into the free zone than in the first and second quarter of the previous year. As a pioneering destination that continues to propel the region’s sustained growth drive for the ICT sector, Dubai Internet City was awarded the prestigious fDi (Foreign Direct Investment) ’Best Hi-tech Free Zone 2008-2009’ Award, firmly reiterating its status as a leading global destination for technology companies.

Hayya! Health Clubs offer value deals on memberships this summer

Hayya! Health Clubs, owned and managed by Emaar Hospitality Group, has developed a value deal this summer that entitles one free month of health and fitness amenities to those who opt for a three-month membership. The special summer offer gives members access to all Hayya! facilities.Mr Phil Bartle, Senior Operations Manager of Hayya!, said: “Hayya! clubs have become an integral component of the lifestyles of residents in Emaar communities as well as other health & and fitness enthusiasts in Dubai. We are adding to the Hayya! differentials of offering an extensive range of amenities and personalized service with value deals this summer.”The summer promotion offers special rates ranging from AED 1,195 for a single membership and AED 1,695 for a couple membership to AED 2,195 for a family membership for a limited period only. Hayya! clubs are located within The Lakes, Town Centre, Meadows Village and The Old Town – Downtown Burj Dubai. The range of facilities include gymnasiums, swimming and lap pools, aerobics studios, squash courts, tennis courts, children’s play areas, change room facilities, along with steam rooms and jacuzzi.To book your 1 Day Free Trial and avail of the summer offer, call 800 Hayya (42992)

Etisalat announces opening of two new Data Centres in UAE

Etisalat today announced the opening of 2 new Data Centres in Al Ain and Dubai adding a total of 10,000 sq.feet of premium data centre floor space equipped with the entire spectrum of redundant infrastructure to expand its total commercial hosting capacity to 50,000 sq feet which is the largest in the GCC. With this latest announcement , Etisalat extends its leadership position in the Data Centre Market with a total of 8 Data Centres with high speed fibre connectivity across the UAE and highly available international links through its redundant international fibre network and EMIX(Emirates Internet Exchange).Etisalat plans to double this capacity and will add 100,000 sq.feet of data centre space in the next three years. The new data centres will serve a rapidly growing customer base from the region looking for a comprehensive service provider to capitalize on the competitive advantages of hosting their IT equipment in a secure, reliable, highly available, and scalable environment at cost effective price points. Etisalat’s data centre customer base is a diverse one and caters to multinationals, government bodies as well as local companies in various key sectors like Insurance, Retail, Manufacturing, Airlines, Banks and Financial institutions."We are constantly striving to raise the bar in providing quality IT infrastructure outsourcing services for organizations to capitalise on," said Abdulla Hashim, VP, Business Solutions, Etisalat. Our network of Data centres across three cities in the UAE represents an integral component of our "Infrastructure-as-a-Service" strategy to make hosting a more compelling  alternative for organizations vis-à-vis on-premise deployments."Moving up the value chain, the focus of the new data centres would be delivery of unmatched value proposition to clients via a prudent and comprehensive portfolio of hosted and fully managed value added services like Managed Servers, Hosted Business Applications, Hosted Security, Storage-as-a-Service, Backup-as-a-Service, Disaster Recovery, and round-the-clock network and security monitoring and management. Etisalat has also been on the cutting edge of hosting technologies by successfully piloting its On-Demand Computing and Virtualization services and intends to launch these commercially by the fourth quarter of this year.Mr.Hashim added, "Given the challenging economic environment, we are seeing rapid adoption of our eHosting & Cloud Computing services as companies move towards entrusting their systems to established data centre specialists rather than building their own so that they can achieve their strategic IT objectives without risking capital expenditure on top-tier data centre infrastructure."In line with its overall strategy, Etisalat has put together several strategic alliances to enrich its Software-as-a-Service (SaaS) value proposition. Etisalat currently offers vulnerability management and email security as part of its SaaS offerings and is working on a roadmap to offer additional business applications to cater to market needs.