Wednesday 15 / May / 2024
MUSCAT: The importance of technology and data in the growth of their companies and its key role in contributing to the nation’s gross domestic product (GDP) growth were highlighted by leading experts at a panel discussion held during the inaugural Gulf Business Summit, organised by Gulf Leaders Circle, recently.
Distinguished speakers and panelists presented their views on the event titled, ‘Building Bridges: Exploring the Economic and Strategic Implications of Saudi Arabia-Oman MoUs and Vision Plans.’
Powered by OQGN, the summit was supported by the Ministry of Commerce, Investment and Industry Promotion (MoCIIP) and Oman Energy Association and saw the presence of leading experts and policy-makers from Oman and Saudi Arabia.
Raid Al Lawati, an expert on technology moderated a panel discussion that saw the participation of Said Al Mandhari (CEO of ITHCA), Saleem Abdullatiff (GM Marketing, Omantel), Mubarak Al Sawafi (Executive Manager-Radio Spectrum Services, Telecommunications Regulatory Authority, Oman), Mansour Al Ajmi (CEO of Majorel Saudi Arabia), and Maqbool Al Wahaibi (CEO of Oman Data Park)
Al Mandhari, CEO of ITHCA, said: “We always seek to support and motivate Omani companies to enter regional and global markets by obtaining investments from strategic investors from outside the Sultanate of Oman. This is to gain high technical capabilities to expand the operational business of Omani companies in new markets.”
He added: The group’s endeavour is to increase exports to Omani technology companies; it will also have a positive impact in increasing the contribution of this sector to the gross domestic product (GDP) of the Omani economy.
“It is time to monetise the data and investment in human capital is crucial as creating jobs in local companies is important.”
Al Mandhari added: “We are fully owned by Oman Investment Authority (OIA) and we invest in ICT companies. Our main goal is to export a lot of technology from Oman and a lot of investment creates startups and entrepreneurship and accelerate them to be regional companies.”
ITHCA sees huge market in Saudi Arabia
He added: “ITHCA has direct investments in 10 companies through private equity and more than 100 companies have been supported through venture capital funds.”
Al Mandhari said: “Lot of companies may struggle initially but even with 20 percent of success with our venture capital investments, they can make an impact and accelerate the growth in the region.”
On the Saudi Arabia market, Al Mandhari said: “We look at Saudi as the biggest potential market after Oman. All our startups begin in Oman with a focus to grow in Saudi Arabia. We believe the technology capabilities in Oman are well accepted in the Saudi market.”
Al Mandhari said that one of ITHCA companies, Innotech and Codeline, recently signed an investment partnership with Saudi company Forming Future. Forming Future is a company specialised in research and development services and empowering communities in innovation and entrepreneurship, headquartered in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, and it invests in emerging technology companies in the region, especially in the field of the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR).
A useful summit: CEO of Majorel, Saudi Arabia
Mansour Al Ajmi, CEO, Majorel Saudi Arabia, said: “Majorel is a multinational company and our presence in Saudi Arabia helps attract significant global customers. We utilise global technologies and search engines to offer top-tier customer service while understanding the local culture. We have unique skills and use emerging technologies that make us stand out in the market.”
He added: “We are keen to expand in Oman and active efforts are being made to establish our footprint. I believe that Oman has a good potential.”
Al Ajmi said: “Such summits are very useful in building bridges between Oman and Saudi Arabia.”
Maqbool Al Wahaibi said: “Oman Data Park (ODP) was started in 2012 when there was hardly anybody talking about cloudification and real serious digital transformation. We were actually ahead of the game. We started by pushing awareness in Oman to different sectors like – the financial sector, utility sector, and oil and gas. And, we talked to them about the cloud and how it would benefit them economically and technologically.”
ODP is default national cloud service provider
Al Wahaibi added: “In 2012, companies were demanding co-location only, which was bringing their servers and storage devices, and placing them into our data centre. Over the years, they started demanding cloud. So, we transformed them into a national cloud. Then, the companies started demanding Software as a Service (SaaS). So, now we are also offering them software and security. Oman is at the forefront of digitalisation among the Middle East and North African countries. It makes sense from an economic perspective because it reduces the capital and the operational cost tremendously.”
He added: “In the IT sector before Cloud, all companies needed data centres that were decentralised. They had to spend a lot of money on data centres– CapEx and OpEx and the IT department. With Cloud, you don’t need to do that anymore. ODP is like the centralised power plant in the cloud era. Everybody shares the IT services out of a centralised cloud service provider. All cost elements are gone and they are just pay-per-use basis, just like you pay the bills for the lights. That’s how the cloud is selling itself.”
The ODP boss said: “Today, ODP is actually the default national cloud service provider in Oman. We are serving around 400 plus corporates in Oman, covering the majority of the key sectors. We helped them avoid capital allocation for building a data centre and reduce their operating cost by 45 percent.
“Moreover, we have the major oil and gas corporations in Oman as our clients. We are serving multiple government entities. In the telecom sector, ODP manages the majority of the sector services through its cloud and DC services.”
The event partners were Ministry of Commerce, Investment and Industry Promotion, OQGN, Seven Seas Petroleum, ITHCA, ODP, Khazaen, Al Maha Petroleum, Petrofac, Opal, Green Tech Mining, Jindal Shadeed, Dunes Middle East, Artic KSA, Port of Salalah, and Dur AlSanam.
