How have you seen adoption of digital products change over the past two years through the pandemic?
Covid-19 was a booster for digital adoption as digital channels were mostly the only channels available to provide and process the services, Covid-19 was an opportunity for government and retail industry to do more digital and services automations, it’s reshaped our thoughts regarding how things can be done.
Moreover, it was start of new era for new normal, it changed the IT industry for a better place, it changed healthcare for a better place, and it also boosted education services to be more global and independent. Covid-19 created an amazing window to take the next steps to fully automate services and digitalise products in a fast and robust manner.
Where do you see the next leap forward in terms of technology adoption? AI? Big data? What is going to change the business paradigm next?
It varies from country to country, in general, the next [adoption] shall be more into AI but it varies from market to market. At Tahaluf, we are working to diversify our products and services.
While we started from digitalisation and automation, we are now moving towards transportation, healthcare, education and AI products, we are working hard to make Tahaluf into a software product, products that can really develop and compete globally, we are so glad that some of our products started to be recognised by leading research bodies such as Gartner and others.
At Tahaluf, we believe that we will be one of largest software houses in the region with 1,000 employees specialising on the most vital industries with a complete set of products that cover most of the governmental and business demands in the market.
Can you explain your new product Maestro to us?
Maestro is a low code, no code platform dedicated to improving the quality of process automation and speed up the process of development, shortening the go to market time. Maestro is now our focus at Tahaluf for 2022, where we are building this product to have all the features and modules that do not exist anywhere else.
We believe Maestro will be the future of coding, as the demand for application development increases, Maestro is the solution as it comes to reduce the time, improve the quality and shorten the process. Maestro can work for small, medium and, even now, for enterprise applications. We developed Maestro with passion to be a leader in market, competing with the best tools in the market with less headache and easier processes.
Currently, more than 70 engineers are dedicated to work on Maestro and empower it with all necessary features and modules to be a leader in this market globally. With Maestro, we forecast to shorten time for application development by a minimum of 60 percent, reducing the cost by a minimum of 50 percent for development, and improving the quality and ability to supply business demand by many times.
Maestro is the solution for eager entities who need a lot of results in less time. What gap was Maestro trying to fill?
Maestro is trying to fill the huge demand of more business applications in less time.
Maestro is trying to solve the problem of huge application demand with very dynamic changes and requirements. Maestro is the solution for this, and it comes to make the process of supplying IT application demand simpler, easier and straightforward.
One good point is also that the total cost of ownership for applications can sometimes can go very high due to bad planning or misjudgement, with Maestro you can forecast 100 percent of the cost without hassle or headache, including unplanned costs, additional licences, and sizing or change requests.
Other than big businesses, multinationals, and the government sector, do you think small businesses are being catered to enough from a technology perspective?
Sure, technology is now processed and used by all sectors in all business sizes. I want to use the term “technology everywhere.” There are no limits to which industry and no limit in where, when and how technology shall be used. Technology is the new brand name for luxury and convenience. Technology is leading now to make the life of people easier in all sectors, all industries, I believe we will see further and further growing demand for technology.
Where does the UAE stand as a technology hub globally?
The UAE is a leader and dominating the top of the pyramid when it comes to technology. With amazing infrastructure, top speed internet, state of art data centres, local presence of international hosting services, hub for most of the international IT businesses, the UAE is a leader in technology. Moreover, with many governmental adoption of IT and fintech ideas being funded, the UAE will be leading more and more in this industry.
The UAE has undertaken a huge effort, from supporting laws to real action, to assure this industry is booking and progressing. I am so glad to see the results of this hard work, and thanks to the UAE leaders who made this possible through inspiration and serious follow-up. When I look back over the last 10 years and I see the changes and improvement, I feel proud of the UAE and I feel positive that in the coming years the country will have more success as an international business hub.
Can you tell us about some the services that you have recently developed?
One of our latest successes is to develop end-to-end products and services for IOT and smart city solutions. So along with Maestro, AI and IoT are now our focus we are working to make ourselves ready for the next wave of smart city solutions and adoption.
We are working on all related pillars to make this really ready and competitive from software, hardware and even the covering network, IoT will be flag market for the next 10 years and it will double many times in a few years.
What’s your management style?
My style is always looking forward with passion and ambition to have ongoing achievements and success, the style can be different from one situation to another, so it’s relaxed when we are in good terms and progress but it can be micro when situations go in the wrong direction. I like always to do the setup, make sure it’s working, then move to next challenge.
I don’t like to stay in same zone, and I am eager for more achievements and success. I believe each progress and achievement we do contributes to our overall ecosystem and improves the quality of people’s lives. I like the quote which says, “Its attitude not aptitude which determines our altitude”.
Humbleness and passion are key values I believe in, I always love to share in the success and to make sure that team members are rewarded and progressing. I adore the relaxed and lovely environment where colleagues love what they do.