Mobiles and phablets are set to be the must-have devices as the Abu Dhabi Electronics Shopper show opens its doors today at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre.
“Mobility is the main feature, people want to be mobile as much as possible, so mobiles, tablets, phablets,” said Jehas Habison, the purchasing manager of Costless Electronics, which will be exhibiting at the show.
"Cameras have fallen badly as customers have moved to digital SLR with high-end features, or they are happy with the ones that are available on their smartphone. Wearable technology has not been a success so far, unfortunately. The Samsung Gear [which has a watch that shows the texts you receive] has not been successful because there is no point to it. Maybe when Google Glass arrives and the safety concerns are sorted … it will be successful."
The capital’s free-to-enter consumer electronics show, in its second year, has doubled in size with more than 10,000 square metres of exhibition space.
The show hopes to emulate the success of Dubai's Gitex Shopper with the UAE leading the world in smartphone penetration, according to Google's Our Global Planet survey.
“We are very confident in the market at present’” said Mr Habison. “We are owned by Abu Dhabi Co-Operative Society and we have tie up with Spar. We will be opening 25 stores in the next three years across the UAE, 10 of them in Abu Dhabi.”
ascott@thenational.ae
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