What to expect in Gitex 2017

Next month will go under the sign of Technology as Gitex 2017 will be welcoming exhibitors and guests once again in Dubai World Trade Center. For 37 years Dubai has been a place where the most recent technology innovations are displayed. Gitex trade show has been inspiring generations and people all over the world as the leading and one of the biggest technology exhibitions with about 147,200 attendees and 4,470 international exhibitors.

Gitex stands for Gulf Information Technology Exhibition and takes place annually in Dubai. Because UAE is the pioneer in new technology adaptation among Middle East countries, no wonder it’s a place where the most major events in the sphere of electronics and technology happen.

So what should one expect from such event and what would be the major points of interest of this year’s exhibition? You will find out below and I assure you, this year is going to be incredibly exciting and promising.

IoT and Smart City concept

The Internet of Things is one of the hottest technology trends these days and of course it will be included in Gitex 2017 program. What makes it so special?

IoT has numerous advantages that benefit greatly to individual users, private and public sectors and even government. From economic point of view, IoT allows manufacturers to automate a lot of processes and thus save time, resources and money. This also means that manpower can be allocated to more complex tasks that require a lot of focus and attention instead of performing monotonous work.

For software developers IoT is a pot of gold because it allows to build applications that can integrate with almost any device: like apps to control your home or garage remotely, health and fitness tracking apps and much more.

IoT is used even in payment systems and good example here is MasterCard with its option of Samsung Pay that allows performing payment transactions at contactless terminals.

With such potential IoT is a key to smart city concept – a city that is maximally digitalized, making life of its citizens easier, happier and more comfortable. Among Middle East Dubai is the pioneer in taking up the role of a smart city and by 2020 the government hopes to completely turn Dubai into Smart Dubai. By now, except for payment and smart energy concepts, the educational sector is also seeing changes: schools use digital chalkboards and there are a lot of opportunities for impaired students thanks to the technology development.

Smart cities will be present at Gitex as well with visitors from 32 countries being interested in this trend specifically and about 6000 visitors being government representatives. The trend is growing fast and Gitex is an amazing opportunity to share experience and knowledge in order to build a secure and progressive future.

Augmented and virtual reality

Pokemon Go, Niantic’s huge success, is nothing less than AR game: a game that combines both artificial and real elements to create a unique experience. And it was just a start: more and more developers implement AR into their products and Gitex will also be seeing these trends at this year’s show.

AR and VR are not only fun technologies to build games with. Above we have mentioned changes in educational sphere and VR is related to it directly. The UAE Ministry of Education has started already to offer VRs to schools to enhance the educational experience and make it more exciting and a lot of establishments now offer 360o –degree virtual experience on their websites with hotels being the most obvious examples.

The thing is that the users today want to know as much as possible about the product or service they are going to use and virtual reality is a great way to show you the product from all the sides before you decide whether you buy it or not. Speaking about schools using VR, it can increase the students’ level of motivation greatly thus resulting in better grades and behavior, which is another key to happy and content society. And even though AR & VR sound fun, one should not underestimate them. For software development companies the advice would be: catch the wave because these trends are in demand today. Implementing AR to your apps has already shown great interest from the users and raise in app sales.

3D printing

Another trend worth paying attention to and which will be present at Gitex is 3D-printing and everything related to it. The media slowed down a bit in discussing all the opportunities the 3D printing offers but government and businesses are aware that it’s a really important segment to research and focus on.

3D printing has evolved into something that is nowadays used in many industries: engineering, medicine, aerospace, etc. and UAE has huge plans involving 3D printing. By 2030 Dubai government aims to have 25% of all buildings to be 3D printed and healthcare sector plans to fast-track 3D prosthesis technology by 2020.

Speaking numbers, 3D printing has a potential to decrease the use of resources and costs by 90%, which, of course, is a great advantage and something to be used within the smart city concept. And because UAE was the first to present a fully integrated strategy for using 3D technology to benefit people, it is essential to have this trend present at Gitex trade show because it’s another thing that will be leading to building Smart Dubai.

Rise of startups

Last year Gitex saw a lot of startups and their presentation was a great success. So in 2017 Gitex will have about 700 startups from 75 countries (with more than 100 startups from UAE solely). For them it’s a great chance to join UAE startup ecosystem and get on wave of latest technologies and innovations at the same time offering their own services to representatives of the world’s leading companies.

Startup Movement at Gitex is dedicated to expansion of startup network and offers a unique opportunity to learn from the best in the industry. One of the best examples of UAE startups would be Souq.com, often called “the Amazon of the Middle East”. It’s an e-commerce platform, which managed to become so successful that Amazon claimed it will be acquiring it. And that’s just one example from hundreds of other great companies that are becoming internationally recognized.

Since businesses are not anymore tied to one place and are becoming global, UAE startup industry is focusing on exploiting their 100% potential to become known worldwide and not be limited to their country of origin. And this also explains the popularity of foreign startups coming to UAE to collaborate with local businesses. According to Innovation VP, Visa, James McGuire, “This region is so important because people are willing to try new things, it’s ideal for us to innovate here - not only to come up with new innovations, but pilot and deploy them too". So there are many companies and startups that prefer to do business in UAE because it’s a great way for them to reach out to global market and be heard and seen.

Celadon is one of the examples of such foreign startups that preferred to relocate to Dubai. Our company is offering app and software development services for UAE region and because we see a lot of enthusiasm towards new ideas and trends we are sure our skills will come in use here.

Overall, UAE region and Dubai specifically is one of the most promising places in the world in terms of new technologies and their development. Gitex 2017 is indeed an outstanding event that is worth visiting even for people from non-tech industry because it’s an opportunity to view what future holds for us.