Start-up ecosystems thrive in the UAE with a boom in Big Data

A company or a business traditionally starts from scratch. From planning to finance to management and execution, start-up ecosystems have faced challenges to establish themselves. Today, the business world is productive, a lot more supportive, and believes in two-way progression. Tech influencers and game-changers across the world are setting the trend of helping entrepreneurial ecosystems thrive. Microsoft supports the fields of tech and business to flourish in the emerging new area of Big Data at Hub71.

The world lives and runs on technology, it exists and procreates over technology. Technology on the other hand is full of Big Data. This data has now become "the new oil" for start-up ecosystems. Recent Global Data research cites the examples of 3.5 billion Google searches and 1.3 billion internet-of-things connections per day, and 254 Exabytes (one Exabyte is a billion gigabytes) of mobile broadband data traffic per year. Big data is a combination of structured, semi-structured, and unstructured data collected by organizations that can be mined for information and used in machine learning projects, predictive modeling, and other advanced analytics applications.

The digital data explosion began in 2010 and has advanced remarkably. Statistics predict it is increasing even more up to 26% by 2022. Big data technologies help companies store large volumes of data while enabling significant cost benefits. Such technologies include cloud-based analytics and Hadoop. They help businesses analyze information and improve decision-making. Furthermore, data breaches pose the need for enhanced security, which technology applications can solve.

The Middle East nations on the other hand are escalating increasingly in terms of health tech, big data, property tech, artificial intelligence, etc. It has become a home for start-up ecosystems and tech in contemporary times. Magnitt, a start-up data analytics company states that more than 60% of investment funding for start-ups in the MENA region was given to the projects based in the UAE in 2019.

The global tech conglomerates like Microsoft, Google, Facebook, and Twitter have already established their MENA Headquarters in the UAE. Hub71, which is located in the heart of Abu Dhabi, has built a niche between the well-established companies to those of budding ones. Its networking capability, its accessibility in terms of capital, communication have all paved a way for Hub71 to grow as an emerging global marketing giant.

"There is a strong start-up culture and plenty of advice available for young entrepreneurs looking for their next move into the Middle East. Microsoft is a leading light in the big data industry across seven technology segments, including data security, storage, processing, aggregation, and integration. The UAE has become a hub in many areas, including technology" stated Sayed Hashish, general manager for Microsoft UAE that has been operating its services from the past 25 years as the strategic partner for Hub71.  He also adds that there is a lot of potential for start-up culture in the UAE for young aspiring entrepreneurs. Microsoft on the other hand, is a torch bearer across seven technological segments, including data security, storage, processing, aggregation and integration.

Hashish said that Microsoft has always believed in focusing on start-ups as its core value. He also mentioned that Hub71 was launched with the central theme of encouraging and establishing start-ups. The timing was absolutely perfect in his view.

Another core mission of Microsoft was to empower every business to turn the game around the planet and Microsoft has already fulfilled that. Apart from building huge data centers operating in the region, the company, which is the only one in the US to still be worth more than US$1trn after the coronavirus pandemic, has made plenty of time to mentor newer companies.

Microsoft and its services have always been incredible in many ways. Atif Mahmoud, Founder of British edtech start-up Teacherly said that opening the company's second office in Abu Dhabi (the first was in London) had given his start-up the boost it needed. He then said that the tech giant joining hands with his once- upon time small start-up was a dream come true.

Putting it in a nutshell, Abu Dhabi's Hub71 literally is reigning in the global tech-business industry with loads of opportunities for aspiring young entrepreneurs wishing to establish start-ups to flourish in Big Data and Microsoft is doing all it can to accelerate the global industry upwards.