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DUBAI INTERNET CITY |
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DUBAI INTERNET CITY |
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This article are brought from Khaleej Times Weekend, October 26, 2000. If a challenging deadline is met head-on, Dubai will have built the world’s first e-government, one of the first business-to-business portals, and an Internet city on a scale the sets a global benchmark. E-VISION General
Shaikh
Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai and Defence Minister of
UAE answers questions after announcing the setting up of free trade zone for
Internet business on October 29, 1999 in Dubai. He said the world’s first tax
free site would offer 100 per cent foreign ownership. Dubai
is thinking fast and it’s thinking big. Twenty-five square kilometers of
cutting edge development, $272 million committed to the project, 180 companies
that have rented the space they need, collected their licences and are raring to
go.
This is the topography of what is
arguably the Middle East’s boldest information technology venture yet: Dubai
Internet City (DIC). On October 29, 2000 the newest Big Project in an emirate
that has a proud legacy of big projects – one that began when Jebel Ali was a
blueprint in the late Shaikh Rashid’s mind – will be declared officially
open.
The man who has been steering this
venture from its birth is General Shaikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown
Prince of Dubai and Defence Minister of UAE. The pace, as it usually is with
General Shaikh Mohammed, has been breakneck. An Internet City has sprung out of
bare desert in 12 months. It has the infrastructure grids in place, a core group
of people, the commitments and the beginnings of a formidable reputation.
Twelve more months
later, by October 2001, an e-government will have taken shape in Dubai. These
are deadlines that might daunt the most bull headed project manager, but for
Dubai, this is a race against time.
It’s also a venture that the big
boys of the global infotech industry have bought into with gusto. Around the
second quarter of 2001, Microsoft (Gulf and Eastern Mediterranean) will move
into its new regional headquarters at Dubai Internet City.
“Dubai Internet City is leading
Dubai’s move towards electronic commerce and the vision of Dubai’s future as
a regional hub for the Internet economy,” said Mohammed Al Gergawi,
Director-General of the Dubai Technology, Electronic Commerce and Media Free
Zone, at the ground-breaking ceremony. “The Net City will have a positive
impact on all economic, business tourism and media sectors.
“Microsoft and the Dubai Government
have long worked together on a number of very key initiatives, and we are
pleased to have this company participating in Dubai Internet City with the very
clear and real commitment it is making today,” he said.
Oracle, Compaq, Commerce One and
Mastercard are already in the neighborhood, and with the buildings in the Dubai
Internet City fully rented and with some the lights blazing, Mohammed Al Gergawi
is delighted. It’s the best advertising for the soundness of the venture,
which has Siemens, Sun Microsystems and Cisco Systems building DIC’s
state-of-the-art information and communications infrastructure. NET
RESULT: “Dubai Internet City is leading Dubai’s move towards electronic
commerce and the vision of Dubai’s future as a regional hub for the Internet
economy,” says Mohammed Al Gergawi, Director-General of the Dubai Technology,
Electronic Commerce and Media Free Zone. These were the first major contracts to be awarded by the DIC which, Al Gergawi said, “will be able to provide us with a world class technical infrastructure”.
The three companies will design, build
and operate advanced systems in four key areas of
DIC’s operational
structure, including a data center, telecommunications and network
infrastructure, Internet connectivity and ISP infrastructure and billing
solutions.
The IT division of Siemens UAE has
been working at Net speed to design, install and test the structure. Cisco is
bringing its ‘New World’ networking solutions to the project, which combines
data and voice communication, while Sun will provide the computing platform and
software applications.
The bricks may be in place, but ever
since the project’s conception, its leaders have been closely listening to
what the marketplace, and the global info-tech players with a presence in Dubai
have been saying. Skilled manpower is a scarce resource in the United Arab
Emirates. It is a scarcity that could be the biggest potential obstacle to the
success of DIC.
Again, as Shaikh Rashid did in early
years of the growing emirate, Dubai is looking abroad to source skilled
Information Technology personnel. The regions of choice include South-East Asia
and Northern Africa. It is a strategy that will give the city-state access to an
untapped resource of skilled IT manpower.
“We are particularly interested in
attracting IT talents fron the Arab world,” General Shaikh Mohammed had said
in an interview earlier this year. “We put high hopes on them, and Dubai
Internet City will offer work opportunities for them as well as for talents
among Arab expatriates abroad who could come back home and enjoy an atmosphere
of financial prosperity and social, political and economic stability.”
How firm is the business model?
After all, analysts within the region
and outside have long spoken of Internet penetration in the regional markets
being too weak to sustain e-commerce based operations. Does Dubai Internet City
then rely mainly on the potential for widespread Internet use in the year to
come?
And what about the medium-term?
What General Shaikh Mohammed wants, is
“an end to frustrating red tape, public queues and long, inefficient processes
in government offices”. This is key, for an e-government will by default be an
e-business driver. If successful, Dubai will be the first in the world to have a
government that makes public services available on a 24x7 basis via the
Internet.
It’s a proposition that has already
gained the support of several IT and telephony companies, world-class players
like Oracle, IBM, Cisco, Nokia, Ericsson, Hewlett-Packard and Nortel. It’s a
proposition that sets out the relationships between government and these
companies to be win-win. And the Authority has taken pains to inform industry
that the DIC is about all IT related companies – whether e-finance,
e-marketing, e-design, multimedia or boring old government tenders. BREAKNECK
SPEED: Phase Zero of Dubai Net City’s initial development area covers three
square kilometers between the city and the Jebel Ali Free Trade Zone and its
doors are open to all computer and Internet companies, big or small.
Yet while the eyes of Dubai and the UAE keep straying to the zone near
the Golf Club, other governments in the Middle East have been reviving up too.
Qatar actually announced an
e-government strategy first, and is planning to migrate to e-government in the
next two and a half years to reduce administrative costs and decrease
bureaucracy.
Egypt has its own answer to Dubai’s
Internet City and is planning to build a media city as well as three ‘smart
villages’ before the end of the year. The project envisions numerous ‘smart
villages’, all linked together to create IT communities across Egypt. It is
part of a government drive that aims at turning the country into an advanced
technology hub.
Jordan – whose programmers have for
years been one of the country’s key resources – too wants in on the act.
Info-tech is already the country’s third largest source of revenue after
phosphate/potassium exports and tourism. The country has set itself the goal of
$550 million in IT exports and inward investment of $150 million from overseas
sources.
Syria – still the most expensive
place to connect to the Internet the Middle East – is in the process of
rapidly upgrading its telecommunications infrastructure, while the Kingdom of
Saudi Arabia wants to establish an IT hub and science park in Jeddah, and has
relaxed both its laws and taxation of foreign business to encourage greater
international trade.
So far, Dubai is ahead of the pack,
and General Shaikh Mohammed aims to keep in that way. If his challenging
deadline is met head-on, Dubai will have built the world’s first e-government,
one of the first business-to-business portals, and an Internet city on a scale
that sets a global benchmark. SNAPSHOT
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Copyright September
2000 -DTEC & MFZA preperad by Lars Olof Kanngard -LOK |
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