Technology

Major Global Investment Themes of 2020 – Tech stocks and Cryptocurrencies

Technology stocks benefit from the pandemic and significantly outperform the benchmark index The top tech companies in the world were among the big winners with the pandemic accelerating the adoption of technology. Apple, Amazon, Netflix, Google, Facebook and Microsoft stocks saw huge gains this year as demand for e-commerce, online advertising and cloud computing during the pandemic led to soaring revenues. Social distancing guidelines resulted in many employees working from home. The biggest winner due to this shift was Zoom...

Languages of the Machine… Do you understand them? You Better!

Most of us, who do not belong to the field of computer sciences, are painstakingly unaware when it comes to the world of programming languages and are afraid to even try and attempt to understand it. There are alphabets, and numbers, and symbols, all working together to form a giant web of disarray (or an artistic masterpiece; depending on how you look at it). We might have had a brief encounter with them in our school life, but have since...

A dab of good food and a dollop of technology!

Customers are increasingly expecting certain advantages when they shop, travel and handle their finances such as digital access, personalization, loyalty tracking and no touch transactions. In a relatively new trend, customers have similar expectations when they dine as well. Restaurant tech is defined as set of innovative technologies that improve the restaurant business and the experience for customers. AI, blockchain, drone delivery, and robotics are expected to play a larger role in the food industry. With a 77% smart phone...

Combining technology with Brick and Mortar stores in the GCC: 6 ideas

Euromonitor International projects that the retail sales across Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia and UAE will increase by more than USD 24 billion over the next five years. The UAE retail industry currently (worth USD 55 billion) will lead the trend reaching to USD 63.8 billion by 2023, at an estimated growth rate of 16%. Non-store modes of retailing such as online shopping, direct selling, social media and home shopping is estimated to grow by 78 percent from 2018 to 2023....

Deep Learning: A more interesting aspect of AI

This article originally published in AME Info. Deep Learning has become one of the most discussed and researched topics of the decade. Deep learning is evolving day by day, and therefore, it is important to understand how and why it works. Deep learning sits at the intersection of Artificial Intelligence (AI) and machine learning.. AI basically implies a range of technologies that enable computer and robots to solve problems in ways that resemble human thinking process. Within this realm is...

What Is the Future of Ecommerce in the Arabian Gulf?

This article originally published in Khaleej Times. The Arabian Gulf or the GCC region’s retail sector has been going through sweeping changes that are not only disrupting the conventional retail but reshaping its future too. In recent times, the mode of retailing in the GCC has gone through substantial changes that was unimaginable a few years back. There are clear signs of transformation in the retail sector in the region. There is increasing scope for e-commerce in the Middle East,...

The promise of 3D printing

A residential house that is a shape of rotor with contemporary style with wooden flooring, furnished with appliances from Samsung, constructed within 24 hours. Imagine making an own range of jewelry, trinkets or tiny add-ons for daily lives. Can we craft sculptures or showpieces smaller than human hair? A custom prosthetic device such as a hearing aid or artificial human limbs and manufacture them at very affordable prices, which benefits the healthcare industry? A 400 square metre two- story villa...

Knitting Digital Worlds Together through APIs

Imagine that you are riding an Uber or Didi Ride back home. In the middle of the ride, you realised that there’s nothing cooked for dinner at home and time is short as you are already late. And you suddenly placed an online order for some fancy food with a newly discovered app and paid it by Paypal or VISA. When you reach your destination, you pay Uber by Paypal and a few minutes later, Mint app pops up a...

Remittance agents can advance with Blockchain technology

The article originally appeared in The National | Business. Traditional business models are being challenged by new disruptive technologies whose speed of development makes the "catch-up" act very difficult. However, if something can provide solutions to problems encountered by businesses and individuals, it is most certainly welcome. One of the biggest problems is faced by the large expat population in the region, which relies on remittances to transfer cash across borders. For an industry worth nearly US$100 billion in the GCC,...

Smart Cities in the GCC

An Emerging Trend Smart City is a hot and happening concept in the field of urban innovation right now. This concept assumes that a city operates as a system or a group of interlocked parts working together, where technology is used to maximize its efficiency and also unlock its potential, while its chief focus remaining on sustainability. What makes cities smart? There have been different perspectives about how a smart city should be or what it should have; however there...