Bucket Tech: Huawei's MEA Summit

The HDC.Together HUAWEI MEA Ecosystem Summit, held in Dubai, showcased a seamless fusion of collaboration and innovation. The first day of the exclusive event was hosted on the 27th of November at the illustrious Dubai Opera, and brought together Huawei Ecosystem partners from China and across the Middle East and Africa.

Building bridges for future growth

Organised in partnership with Dubai Economy and Tourism (DET) and the Saudi Tourism Authority (STA), the focus of the summit was on fostering innovation, economic growth, and developments in technology and tourism.

When converging technology and opportunity, HDC.Together acts as the bridge connecting the MEA region and China, fostering innovation, partnerships, and business exchange across markets, paving the way for growth and a better future.

Throughout the summit, speakers emphasised the importance of collaborative efforts within Huawei’s Ecosystem for advancing technology and innovation. Eng. Maryam Al Balooshi, Vice Chair and UAE representative of the Committee of Aviation Environment Protection (CAEP)- ICAO, emphasised that, “In the ever-evolving landscape of technology, Huawei’s ecosystem stands as a testament to transformative collaboration, enriching experiences by building bridges for a better future.”

Additionally, His Excellency Ali Khalifa bin Thalith, Secretary-General of HIPA, shared some profound insights. “Through the lens of innovation, HUAWEI Themes has not just adorned our digital spaces but has become a platform to globalise the beauty of art and photography, making creativity universally accessible to users with an impressive download of over 1,000,000 on the official HUAWEI Themes store,” he said.

Acclaimed Emirati artist Mahmood Al Abadi shared the story of his successful journey with calligraphy and arts, as well as his collaboration with HUAWEI Themes, and how it elevated his digital experience. He expressed his excitement about the vast array of customisable themes and their seamless integration with HUAWEI smartphones, foldable phones, tablets and smartwatches.

Strategising for the year ahead

The event outlined a comprehensive 2024 action plan with 24 strategic partners joining the conversation, formalising commitments to innovation and growth across regions including the Emirates, Arabian Oud, Jahez and Viu, all who expressed their commitment to these shared goals.

The summit featured dynamic discussion panels and round tables, engaging industry experts to provide insights into industry trends, and further explored the collaborative potential of HUAWEI AppGallery and Petal Ads.

Unveiling Prospects with AppGallery

With a focus on fostering new growth opportunities in gaming, HUAWEI AppGallery is taking advantage of Huawei’s rapid expansion across the MEA region and China. The summit also served as a platform for facilitating partnerships and collaboration between local and global players, fostering an environment of innovation and mutual growth. Participants were treated to working presentations and demos, sharing insights, case studies and success stories from top regional and global gaming partners, offering a overview of the latest market trends. Industry leaders joined the MEA Game Business Trends panel, unpacking esports, Government support, the payment landscape and the importance of localisation. The summit set the stage for AppGallery to stake its claim as a driving force in the gaming industry, uniting key players for a future of unprecedented success and collaboration.

Global perspective

Emirates provided an insightful account of its journey with Huawei Ecosystem, highlighting their successful collaboration and providing valuable benchmarks for the broader travel industry, emphasising the power of strategic partnerships within the evolving technological landscape. This year, Emirates App successfully released a version designed for Huawei’s smartwatches that allows users to use QR codes as boarding passes.

Petal Ads and regional insights

 Additionally, Middle East Communications Network (MCN) provided a comprehensive analysis of global and regional advertising trends tailored for regional advertisers. This included an in-depth overview of the current global advertising landscape, emerging trends, consumer behaviour patterns, and effective strategies. The presentation highlighted Petal Ads’ advanced capabilities in delivering enriched user experiences, setting the stage for a new era in the advertising market.

The summit delivered the perfect platform for HMS to introduce new solutions and innovations, underscoring a commitment to connect with customers, enable brand growth, and embrace future challenges. Ultimately, the annual HDC.Together HUAWEI MEA Ecosystem Summit highlighted Huawei’s unwavering dedication to fostering collaboration, innovation, and a connected future, showcasing knowledge sharing and cutting-edge solutions within Huawei’s thriving ecosystem, while uniting partners from China and MEA.

Bucket Tech: Lenovo ThinkReality VRX

On Monday, July 3rd, ahead of AWE USA 2023, Lenovo announced the new ThinkReality™ VRX all-in-one virtual reality (VR) headset engineered for the enterprise is now available for purchase in select markets worldwide. The immersive, comfortable, slim profile, six-degrees-of-freedom (6DoF) VR solution is powered by the Snapdragon® XR2+ Gen 1 processor and provides full-color, high-resolution pass-through capabilities for mixed reality applications. The ThinkReality VRX is also supported by a full suite of end-to-end services to help organizations achieve success and realize ROI faster.

The ThinkReality VRX starts at $1,299 and is expected to be available in select markets worldwide starting in June 2023.1 Enterprise pricing is available based on volume of deployment. Lenovo offers Device as a Service (DaaS) financing and service models through TruScale so customers can better adopt and scale XR solutions to transform the enterprise. Customers can visit the ThinkReality VRX web page to find out more or contact a local Lenovo sales representative. Attendees will also get an opportunity to demo the ThinkReality VRX on display at Lenovo’s booth (#219) at AWE USA 2023 in Santa Clara, US, between May 31- June 2, 2023.

VR engineered for the enterprise

The enterprise-only Lenovo ThinkReality VRX is built to be the VR solution for workers everywhere. The immediacy and fidelity of new digital tools experienced through extended reality (XR) devices means workforces are becoming nearly unconstrained by time and space. From improving efficiency in employee training and virtual collaboration to expanding design and engineering tasks in 3D, XR technologies are becoming more important than ever for businesses enabling workers to do more.

“Lenovo’s customers are looking for reliable, flexible, and scalable gateways into the growing Enterprise Metaverse. They need business-class solutions for the new realities of working in virtual environments and hybrid scenarios,” said Vishal Shah, GM of XR and Metaverse, Lenovo. “We engineered the Lenovo ThinkReality VRX to be the VR solution of choice for training and collaborating in immersive 3D because that’s the future of work.”

Engineered to meet the needs of enterprise organizations with purpose-built construction and hygienic materials, the ThinkReality VRX is built for long life and reliable operation. It is also supported by enterprise-grade security requirements with a protected supply chain and manufacturing process.

The new VR headset incorporates a variety of design advancements to make it more comfortable for extended VR sessions. Innovative pancake optics help keep the form factor slim. The high-capacity battery is optimally positioned for better weight distribution, and the ThinkReality VRX features a unique venting system that channels heat from the display away from the wearer’s face.

The ThinkReality VRX is part of Lenovo’s ThinkReality portfolio of XR solutions that includes a cloud software platform to help deploy and manage enterprise applications and content on a global scale. The ThinkReality VRX can also be supported by other leading mobile device management (MDM) platforms. Additional XR solutions from Lenovo include ThinkReality xR Services; providing vendor agnostic, end-to-end, white-glove services to help customers from strategy to delivery.

The ThinkReality VRX joins Lenovo’s hardware portfolio of commercial XR solutions which also includes the ThinkReality A3, the most versatile augmented reality (AR) smart glasses ever designed for the enterprise. Whether the enterprise is expanding the use of immersive experiences in VR to enhance learning and collaboration or using AI-enabled digital overlays of real-world scenarios with AR to transform workflows, Lenovo ThinkReality has the solutions needed.

Open ecosystem of XR applications

Building the Enterprise Metaverse requires interoperability and the collective efforts of leading hardware and software vendors. To this end, Lenovo is dedicated to collaborating with industry leaders to advance the growth and adoption of XR solutions to transform how people work, learn and take care of their health. Enterprises and other organizations can develop for the ThinkReality VRX by utilizing Snapdragon Spaces™ XR Developer Platform and its OpenXR-based SDK. The accessible Snapdragon Spaces ecosystem enables developers to pioneer innovative experiences that lead the next generation of spatial computing.

Lenovo is working with several XR developers independently and through the Snapdragon Spaces platform to make cutting edge applications available on the ThinkReality VRX. The most popular enterprise VR use cases today are immersive training for hard and soft skills, as well as collaboration in 3D environments.

Lenovo ThinkReality is collaborating with these developers among many others through Snapdragon Spaces and is continually expanding its ecosystem.