Description
Those days have long gone since Dubai used to be stereotyped with Camels, Deserts and White tunics instead the new visuals that come to mind are skyscrapers, luxury cars and technologically advanced attractions.
Dubai has been a dream a destination for many people over and over again because every year the famous Emirate brings something new for the world to witness. Dubai is always on the move continually developing new areas and upgrading existing ones in terms of infrastructure, transit systems and tourists’ attractions and so on. What has become the new integral element to Dubai’s groundbreaking urbanization method is the inclusiveness of digitalization and techno symbiosis with their already existing facilities. The dream of His Highness Sheikh Mohammad Bin Rashid Al Maktoum is to make Dubai the quote “Happiest City on Earth”, and this is currently sought through the Smart Dubai Initiative that is soon reaching its final resolving years as the deadline was set till 2021.
Currently, as you browse through this wonderful article, the city of Dubai is busy leveraging the technology to its optimum effectiveness to make life much simpler for the citizens and visitors of Dubai. For complete understanding the Dubai’s current digital and technological advancements, it is essential to break them down into the various essentials that influence the citizens due to which the government put priority based efforts to spend on certain vital facilities and establishments that boosts the prominent and much desired Dubai lifestyle.
Cutting Edge Infrastructure
Dubai has always been a global leader in infrastructure gifting the world with the monumental attractions such as the Burj Khalifa, Burj Al Arab, Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC) and the Future Accelerator. Always on the brink of development with the incorporation of advanced technology, Dubai is becoming a key player and a role model in what other nations believe the right way to create a smart city most feasible. Dubai has always promoted growth through new business opportunities, and the provision of advanced workspaces for start-ups and franchise owners has been a significant contribution by the infrastructure sector of the Alpha Emirate.
Dubai Future Accelerator
The Dubai Future Foundation had started the initiative as a government collaborative venture to launch the Dubai Accelerator to ensure the trajectory of scientific discoveries and technological developments are always progressive. This Future Accelerator was created to be a nurturing ground for global tech companies to pool in resources and knowledge to work collectively for a more sustainable future. The accelerator promotes the research on various futuristic projects that could widely influence the way human beings co-exist in the next few decades. A few of these projects that are housed under developmental stages in the Dubai Future Accelerator are
- Biotechnology
- Artificial Intelligence
- Robotics
- Genomics
- Biomimicry
- Digital ledger technology
- Advanced digital security solutions
Intercity Connectivity and Transit
- Nol Cards
The Nol card is a digitized smart card exclusive to Dubai which provides the holder with access throughout all forms of public transport available in Dubai. The price for a basic Blue Nol Card is AED 70 with AED 20 being an initial top-up. The different kinds of public transportation that Nol cards grant accessibility to are – buses, metro, water taxis, road taxis, and trams. The Nol cards are also available with different features such as
- Blue Nol Card with longtime validity for frequent travelers such as citizens
- Silver Nol Card with short time validity for tourists
- Gold Nol Cards for premium high price seats in Metro
- Red Nol cards that do not have minimum balance but have a number of trips for a particular route for customers who follow a common route every day such as office employees
- Smart Transit
The Smart Dubai Initiative also included developing a simplified yet tech savvy transit system that could help citizens commute through the ends and edges of Dubai without utilizing much of their time stuck in dense traffic jams. This system has also been proven to improve the employee productivity rate in Dubai as employees spend less time traveling and hence, reach workplaces on time without being exhausted during travel due to the intensely heated weather conditions. The transit system consists of a network of different public commute variations that can be accessed with a common smartcard called Nol cards. The various commute services part of the smart transit system are
- Metro-lines – network spread across the city except for inner residential areas
- Monorails – Connects to the route of the Palm Jumeirah to simplify travel for tourists
- Buses and Trams – Citywide connectivity through buses even to nearby stops of residential areas
- Water Taxis – come in variations of advance speed boats as well as traditional wooden boats called ‘abras.’
- Road Taxis – Road Taxis for accessing the dense routes in Dubai such as routes connecting to shopping complexes, offices and so on
Citizens who want to use public transit can access the Dubai RTA website to avail online services such as route maps for different transport services, making personalized Nol cards, payment and recharge on Nol cards, registering complaints regarding services and so on.
Global Events
There is no other more straightforward way to put this than to say that Dubai has become a technological playground for new inventions and corporate amusement park for companies to settle in and work their magic. The maximum amount of credit for this can only be given to the multitude of global events that have been conducted in Dubai across the decade. The major events held in Dubai that have been in conversation throughout the globe are
- Blockchain Summit Dubai 2018
- Future Tech Week 2018
- Step Conference and HITEC Dubai 2018
- Dubai Expo 2020
These factors mentioned above are only a few of the many benefits that Dubai has to offer for new businesses. New Businesses can become overnight beneficiaries of the cohesive working environment that the Emirate provides and establish and operate a healthy company. Though we are aware that the process of business setup in Dubai can be a tiresome and exhausting one, we will be more than happy to provide you with the benefit of our expertise and network to well simplify the process.
