The inside of an Ericsson AB 5G capable Massive MIMO antenna is displayed at the Sprint Corp. booth during the Mobile World Congress Americas event in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Friday, Sept. 14, 2018. The conference features prominent executives representing mobile operators, device manufacturers, technology providers, vendors and content owners from across the world. Photographer: Patrick T. Fallon/Bloomberg
The inside of an Ericsson AB 5G capable Massive MIMO antenna is displayed at the Sprint Corp. booth during the Mobile World Congress Americas event in Los Angeles, California, U.S., on Friday, Sept. 1Show more

Technology

UAE telcos to gain up to $3bn from digitalisation by 2026, Ericsson says

5G technology will transform industries and create new revenue streams - study

Sarah Townsend

25 September, 2018

Telecom operators in the UAE stand to gain an additional $3.3 billion (Dh12.1bn) in revenues by 2026, with manufacturing presenting the biggest opportunity, according to a report from Swedish telecommunications company Ericsson.

“Digital transformation is taking place in almost every industry, disrupting and creating new business models, and 5G is an enabler of this transformation,” said Rafiah Ibrahim, head of Ericsson Middle East and Africa on Tuesday.

Expanded mobile platforms developed by technology and telecom companies in the region are already enabling service providers to capture opportunities from digitalisation, “while addressing the explosive traffic growth expected in the 5G evolution”, he added.

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5G is the name used to describe the fifth generation of cellular mobile communications, which is poised to transform data capture, underpinning the Internet of Things - a catch-all term for products and services connected to the web to capture and share data - by connecting at a much faster rate.

The technology will enable digitalisation of 10 industries in particular - agriculture, manufacturing, energy and utilities, public safety, health care, public transport, media and entertainment, automotive, financial services and retail – Ericsson said in its "guide to capturing the 5G industry digitalisation business potential" study.

This will generate $619bn of revenues by 2026, led by the manufacturing sector which will account for $113bn of global revenues from digitalisation, and energy and utilities with $101bn.

In the UAE, industry growth potential is also driven by the digitalisation of manufacturing, which is expected to contribute 18 per cent of potential revenues by 2026. This is followed by energy and utilities with 16 per cent and public safety with 12.5 per cent, according to Ericsson.

UAE mobile operators will see the most revenue potential from real-time automation, which offers a potential $530 million of additional revenues by 2026 as automated services like mobile messaging and user data analytics is adopted at a rate of 133 per cent per year between 2020 and 2024 and will continue to rise steadily after that, the report said.

Other revenue potential will come from enhanced video services, bringing in $510m, and monitoring and tracking with $380m.

Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.

Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.

“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.

“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.

Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.

From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.

Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.

BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.

Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.

Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.

“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.

Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.

“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.

“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”

The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”

Company Profile

Company name: Cargoz
Date started: January 2022
Founders: Premlal Pullisserry and Lijo Antony
Based: Dubai
Number of staff: 30
Investment stage: Seed

MATCH DETAILS

Barcelona 0

Slavia Prague 0

WHAT IS THE LICENSING PROCESS FOR VARA?

Vara will cater to three categories of companies in Dubai (except the DIFC):

Category A: Minimum viable product (MVP) applicants that are currently in the process of securing an MVP licence: This is a three-stage process starting with [1] a provisional permit, graduating to [2] preparatory licence and concluding with [3] operational licence. Applicants that are already in the MVP process will be advised by Vara to either continue within the MVP framework or be transitioned to the full market product licensing process.

Category B: Existing legacy virtual asset service providers prior to February 7, 2023, which are required to come under Vara supervision. All operating service proviers in Dubai (excluding the DIFC) fall under Vara’s supervision.

Category C: New applicants seeking a Vara licence or existing applicants adding new activities. All applicants that do not fall under Category A or B can begin the application process through their current or prospective commercial licensor — the DET or Free Zone Authority — or directly through Vara in the instance that they have yet to determine the commercial operating zone in Dubai. 

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Company Profile

Name: HyveGeo
Started: 2023
Founders: Abdulaziz bin Redha, Dr Samsurin Welch, Eva Morales and Dr Harjit Singh
Based: Cambridge and Dubai
Number of employees: 8
Industry: Sustainability & Environment
Funding: $200,000 plus undisclosed grant
Investors: Venture capital and government

A Cat, A Man, and Two Women
Junichiro Tamizaki
Translated by Paul McCarthy
Daunt Books 

How to register as a donor

1) Organ donors can register on the Hayat app, run by the Ministry of Health and Prevention

2) There are about 11,000 patients in the country in need of organ transplants

3) People must be over 21. Emiratis and residents can register. 

4) The campaign uses the hashtag  #donate_hope

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A Long Way Home by Peter Carey
Faber & Faber

Stamp duty timeline

December 2014: Former UK chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne reforms stamp duty land tax (SDLT), replacing the slab system with a blended rate scheme, with the top rate increasing to 12 per cent from 10 per cent:

Up to £125,000 – 0%; £125,000 to £250,000 – 2%; £250,000 to £925,000 – 5%; £925,000 to £1.5m: 10%; More than £1.5m – 12%

April 2016: New 3% surcharge applied to any buy-to-let properties or additional homes purchased.

July 2020: Chancellor Rishi Sunak unveils SDLT holiday, with no tax to pay on the first £500,000, with buyers saving up to £15,000.

March 2021: Mr Sunak extends the SDLT holiday at his March 3 budget until the end of June.

April 2021: 2% SDLT surcharge added to property transactions made by overseas buyers.

June 2021: SDLT holiday on transactions up to £500,000 expires on June 30.

July 2021: Tax break on transactions between £125,000 to £250,000 starts on July 1 and runs until September 30.

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COMPANY PROFILE

Company name: Klipit

Started: 2022

Founders: Venkat Reddy, Mohammed Al Bulooki, Bilal Merchant, Asif Ahmed, Ovais Merchant

Based: Dubai, UAE

Industry: Digital receipts, finance, blockchain

Funding: $4 million

Investors: Privately/self-funded

UAE currency: the story behind the money in your pockets
How to wear a kandura

Dos

  • Wear the right fabric for the right season and occasion 
  • Always ask for the dress code if you don’t know
  • Wear a white kandura, white ghutra / shemagh (headwear) and black shoes for work 
  • Wear 100 per cent cotton under the kandura as most fabrics are polyester

Don’ts 

  • Wear hamdania for work, always wear a ghutra and agal 
  • Buy a kandura only based on how it feels; ask questions about the fabric and understand what you are buying
JOKE'S ON YOU

Google wasn't new to busting out April Fool's jokes: before the Gmail "prank", it tricked users with mind-reading MentalPlex responses and said well-fed pigeons were running its search engine operations .

In subsequent years, they announced home internet services through your toilet with its "patented GFlush system", made us believe the Moon's surface was made of cheese and unveiled a dating service in which they called founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page "Stanford PhD wannabes ".

But Gmail was all too real, purportedly inspired by one – a single – Google user complaining about the "poor quality of existing email services" and born "millions of M&Ms later".

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AS IT STANDS IN POOL A

1. Japan - Played 3, Won 3, Points 14

2. Ireland - Played 3, Won 2, Lost 1, Points 11

3. Scotland - Played 2, Won 1, Lost 1, Points 5

Remaining fixtures

Scotland v Russia – Wednesday, 11.15am

Ireland v Samoa – Saturday, 2.45pm

Japan v Scotland – Sunday, 2.45pm

Buy farm-fresh food

The UAE is stepping up its game when it comes to platforms for local farms to show off and sell their produce.

In Dubai, visit Emirati Farmers Souq at The Pointe every Saturday from 8am to 2pm, which has produce from Al Ammar Farm, Omar Al Katri Farm, Hikarivege Vegetables, Rashed Farms and Al Khaleej Honey Trading, among others. 

In Sharjah, the Aljada residential community will launch a new outdoor farmers’ market every Friday starting this weekend. Manbat will be held from 3pm to 8pm, and will host 30 farmers, local home-grown entrepreneurs and food stalls from the teams behind Badia Farms; Emirates Hydroponics Farms; Modern Organic Farm; Revolution Real; Astraea Farms; and Al Khaleej Food. 

In Abu Dhabi, order farm produce from Food Crowd, an online grocery platform that supplies fresh and organic ingredients directly from farms such as Emirates Bio Farm, TFC, Armela Farms and mother company Al Dahra. 

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Favourite book: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

Holiday choice: Anything Disney-related

Proudest achievement: Receiving a presidential award for foreign services.

Family: Wife and three children.

Like motto: You always get what you ask for, the universe listens.

Plastic tipping points
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Herc's Adventures

Developer: Big Ape Productions
Publisher: LucasArts
Console: PlayStation 1 & 5, Sega Saturn
Rating: 4/5

'The Predator'
Dir: Shane Black
Starring: Olivia Munn, Boyd Holbrook, Keegan-Michael Key
Two and a half stars

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Director: Anurag Kashyap​​​​​​​
Cast: Abhishek Bachchan, Taapsee Pannu, Vicky Kaushal​​​​​​​
Rating: 3.5/5