I was at our Management World Middle East event last week, held in Dubai on 3rd – 5th March . It proved to be an interesting and vibrant show in one of the most vibrant economies I have ever seen. Everywhere you look in the region you see construction. Literally hundreds of skyscrapers are under construction, including the new 'biggest building in the world', which no doubt will be superceded within 12 months of it being completed by some other mind-blowing structure!!
We had an attendance of around 150 people at our Middle East event and about 50% of these came from all the major Service Providers in the region. There was also a strong presence at the event from the regulatory authorities of the region, with attendees from both UAE and Kuwait regulators.
It is interesting, but not surprising to see that the challenges facing this region are similar if not identical to the challenges facing the other major regions of the world. The presentations at the event covered similar topics to our equivalent events in Europe, USA or Asia. And the audience was equally knowledgeable and concerned over the diverse challenges of mobile configuration management, launching IPTV services, operations & business process reengineering and mobile advertising. In this industry it really is a small world!