CareZone: The #MENA’s first mobile platform with a heart
A new application from Dubai is looking to give consumers a way to feel good about their purchases. The application which is developed by the Dubai based Innoventa, a leading provider of integrated solutions in management and marketing focusing mainly on the internet and mobile spaces, was recently launched and is a great and simple idea for people to shop, get rewards and help a cause. CareZone has a neat design and is easy to use. It is basically... Read More
Report: Mobile Apps usage in the MENA region
A report released earlier this month by AppsArabia and Real Opinions gives some great insight about the MENA regions smartphone usage. The research which was sponsored by RIM, which mainly aims to increase and support the developers in the region. The research which was conducted online in both English (23%) and Arabic (77%) with almost 3,000 respondents and contains a vast amount of information regarding the region which should interest all developers... Read More
The rise of Mobile in the MENA
Last week we posted an article about some interesting information released by Effective Measure regarding mobile internet consumption in the MENA region. Apparently brands in the region have noticed this trend and have started reacting to this consumer need by producing either mobile apps or mobile websites to connect with users on the go. The latest company to do so is Dubizzle, they have launched their mobile website dubai.dubizzle.com/m earlier... Read More
VoilaDubai: A new discovery & sharing engine in Dubai
Last week I came across a new startup from Dubai, called VoilaDubai, it was a neat looking website and had some interesting content but you could tell that it was either recently launched or not well managed. So I decided to get in touch with them to see what was going on and it turns out that the site had just recently launched, and I’d say that the website is managed pretty well just from the level of responsiveness I got from Farah... Read More
GCC sees 34% increase in mobile internet consumption
In their latest newsletter Effective measure released some information on mobile internet consumption in the MENA region, which shows strong growths all over the region mainly in the GCC and the levant where there was a 34% increase in mobile browsing in the Gulf from March to April 2011 with the Levant just trailing with around 33% growth as you can see from the image below: Another set of important information released were the browsing patterns... Read More
Confessions of a social media expert: Arto Joensuu
This article is sponsored by the marcusevans Middle East Social Media Marketing conference that will take place on the 29th & 30th of May in Dubai. We will be writing more articles in this format leading up to the conference where we will ask the expert speakers of the conference different questions related to social media and in the MENA region. Our second expert is Arto Joensuu. Arto Joensuu is the Head of Digital Marketing, Middle East and... Read More
Confessions of a social expert with Racha Mourtada
This article is sponsored by the marcusevans Middle East Social Media Marketing conference that will take place on the 29th & 30th of May in Dubai. We will be writing more articles in this format leading up to the conference where we will ask the expert speakers of the conference different questions related to social media and in the MENA region. Our first expert is Racha Mourtada. Racha Mourtada is a Research Associate with the Governance and... Read More
Blackberry Playbook Review
A couple of days ago we got our hands on the new Blackberry Playbook here in the UAE. The device looks sleek without any buttons on surface everything is controlled via hand gestures. It does however have a small on/off button above the screen on the edge along with a increase/decrease volume and pause play button. When I started to fiddle with it I was lost and very unimpressed I opened an application and couldn’t figure out how to go back... Read More
App dev days summary (Day 2) iPhone development basics
Day two of the event at twofour54 in Abu Dhabi, which held 3 different sessions running in parallel. The first session covered Blackberry development the other was covering development for Symbian and the last (the one we attended) was the iPhone iOS basics. The key speaker was Amir Jahanlou from SAE Institute Dubai, he specializes in developing apps and 3D games. Amir started off with explaining the advantages of developing for mobile which include... Read More
App Dev Days summary (Day 1)
Today twofour54 held a very useful and exciting mobile user experience (UX) training session with the presence of David Ashford of Apps Arabia, Magnus Nystedt Group Editor at the Corporate Publishing International (CPI), the publishing house that brings pcworld and macworld Middle East. And the main speaker was Oliver Weidlich of Mobile Experience: Director of Design & Innovation. After a quick round of introductions, David Ashford took the floor... Read More
The Internet Show Middle East Survey Report 2011
A report released by The Internet Show Middle East reveals important information about online and social marketing in the MENA region. The aim of the survey is to gain insight into how Middle Eastern businesses are currently dealing with internet business issues and the challenges they face now and in the future. The event which will take place on September 27 – 28 in Abu Dhabi will cover the major issues that the report raised. Background... Read More
Mobile photography apps that turn heads!
1. Photosythn A lot of coverage has been given lately to Photosynth a new photography app released by Microsoft on the iTunes Appstore. I’m not very big on photography so I didn’t really pay much attention at the time until I downloaded the application which you can do so from here (the best part its free!) and I must admit the app is a must have on your phone. The beauty of the app is that it doesn’t require any additional programs... Read More
Apps development day – Free event
A free event Apps Dev Days open for all to attend about developing mobile applications and considering designing apps for mobile. It is a collaborative event between twofour54, Apps Arabia and Corporate Publishing International (CPI). The event will be held on April 24 – 25 in Abu Dhabi in twofour54′s headquarters, tadreeb which is a part of twofour54 will host a series of free workshops and seminars around mobile application development. The... Read More
Cutting the internet was inappropriate!
During the Egyptian revolution the previous outed regime tried everything to curb momentum of the uprising that was spawned with the help of social media networks they even cut mobile and internet communications. Well The Cabinet of Ministers in Egypt described that decision as “inappropriate”. Not only that they even stated that such acts will not be allowed to happen in the future. Of course there are rules and regulations according... Read More
Etisalat and Nokia to partner up for OVI store payments
Nokia and Etisalat are looking forward to start a collaboration where users can download applications from the Nokia Ovi Store and get billed directly from through their mobile phone accounts. This collaboration will be available in all countries that Etisalat operates in i.e. UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt by this year. The good thing is that any Etisalat customer can use this service post and/or prepaid accounts. However I’m not sure how Nokia... Read More
Mobile Advertising in the MENA region
Recently I launched an iphone application which we mentioned here, now since this was our first application the main concept behind it was more of a learning experience than actually generating large sums of money, and so far it has proven to be just that. Obviously we had done a lot of research before we started but still some things you have to pick up on your own. Not surprisingly most of the knowledge we gained was from blogs, forums and the... Read More
There’s an app for that!
After almost a year ago I got an idea to start developing mobile applications targeting users from the MENA region, but I couldn’t quite get my head around an application that I would like to use I was leaning towards games (because I’m a big fan of all sorts of games) however one day I was chatting with a friend and he inspired me to develop an application that actually compliments an actual game instead of just being a game itself. And... Read More
It’s official we’re a media partner with the Apps World and Social Media World Forum Middle East events
You might have noticed that we have added two banners in our sidebar, those are for the upcoming Apps world Middle East event and Social Media World Forum Middle East event Both events will be held in the same venue at the Dubai World Trade Center on the 2nd & 3rd of May 2011. Six Degrees an events and exhibitions company specializing in running social media related conferences & exhibitions, confirmed that they are still working on finding... Read More
Going Mobile
Ok so I have been visiting the Du Kiosk’s here in Dubai, UAE for quite some time now and on many occasions I could never find the new iPhone 4 in stock, it was always sold out. It was the same with Etisalat. That got me seriously thinking about the future of this site, with a great number of people online who are consuming content and information online having a blog is no longer enough. We have to be where the users are and we have to provide... Read More
Top Apps in the iTunes store: MENA Edition
So after much thought I decided to look up what Applications on the iTunes store are being bought for the iPhone, I was interested in seeing how people in the MENA region are using their iPhones and what type of applications they are willing to spend their money on. So I logged onto the iTunes store and dug up the following on the top 10 PAID applications from each country: There are 8 countries from the MENA region that are included in the iTunes... Read More
