Home to a population of 337million, the MENA region is currently grossly underrepresented in the online arena with only 56M Internet users searching in Arabic (17%)[i].
Headlining Google Day. Arabia 2.0, Vinton Cerf, Google’s Vice President and Chief Internet Evangelist, presented an overall perspective for the future of the Internet and the challenges and prospects for innovation in Emerging Markets and MENA.
Addressing more than 100 C-level executives and government officials from the UAE, Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Qatar, Cerf highlighted how the Internet has changed the way we communicate and do business. “The Internet has permanently altered world trade, reducing barriers to market entry, bringing companies closer to their customers and creating opportunities that reach beyond traditional geographic boundaries. The Internet has created brand new markets and provided endless opportunities to individuals and businesses.
"What we now need is to focus on local examples. The MENA region is predicted to have 82M Internet users by 2013 and many will have brilliant ideas that can be development. As leaders, it is vital to focus our efforts on fostering and hardnessing those skills. There is also an onus on all of us as individuals, entrepreneurs, businesses and governments, to innovate and increase the availability of Arabic content online. By doing so we can positively influence the region’s ongoing social and economic development.”
Focusing on innovation and how the Middle East can quickly play catch-up to other markets, Mohammad Gawdat, Google’s Managing Director Emerging Markets delivered a keynote on Google’s 9 Rules for Innovation. Placing heavy emphasis on the creation of an eco-system that allows creativity to thrive, Gawdat stressed how innovation can only occur through trial and error.
“By providing Internet users with the tools to share information and by supporting them and helping them to grow their projects, the MENA region will be able to highlight their skill to a global audience. Innovation is not possible without the support of the private sector and government. Today's gathering is about opening the debate around the true value of the Internet, it is about encourging the industry's leaders to discuss the opportunities avalaible in our market and for us to understand how this region can use the Internet to facilitate economic growth and development," said Gawdat.
Illustrating the success that can be achieved in the online content development space, Google invited Jeeran, the first Arab web hosting community, to outline how significant the need for user generated content is in the Arab world. Established in 2000, the Jeeran community today has over 1million members and 7 million visits per month, in addition to hosting 800,000 active websites and 112,000 blogs, underpinning the regions high demand.
Hugo Barra, Google’s Product Management Director and Global Product Lead for Mobile-showcasing joined the innovation drive by showcasing Google’s latest mobile innovations. The demonstrations sought highlight the power of the Internet and the ways in which modern day devices are helping people use the Internets.
Encouraging debate amongst the regions leaders, Google also invited key industry players to discuss the role of the government in scaling and fostering innovation and the future of the internet and its role in MENA. Joined by the Jordanian Minister of Information Communication & Technnology, H. E. Marwan Juma, the UAE’s Head of the Telecom Regulatory Authority, H. E. Mohamed Al Ghanem and the CEO of Egypt’s ITIDA (Information Technology Industry Development Agency) Dr Hazem Abdel Azim, all agreed that development in the online arena is increasingly vital for the Middle East to compete at a global level.
“As more countries, governments, communities and individuals become connected to the Internet, there will be a new wave of evolution impacting the demographics, culture and content that will be represented online. In the future we will see the currently dominant online populations from the US and Europe overtaken by masses gaining connectivity from the Middle East, Africa and Asia. More people will access the web through mobile devices, and internationalised domain names will bring local language characters – including Arabic – to web addresses,” concluded Cerf.
