TUNISIA. There has been robust growth in Internet access and usage over the past few years and Africa is now primed to take advantage of the social and economic opportunities that the Internet can bring to people across the continent. This was the focus of an address delivered to delegates at the Africa Internet Summit (AIS) recently held in Tunisia by Kathy Brown, President & CEO of […]
Some things can’t be summed up in 140 characters. Twitter Inc’s (TWTR.N) announcement that Dick Costolo would exit as CEO on July 1 was long on plaudits but offered few clues on how the company will tackle its biggest problem: user growth. Twitter’ shares were down 0.6 percent in early afternoon trading on Friday, after rising much as 3.9 percent just after the opening, as investors assessed […]
Dick Costolo, CEO of Twitter (pictured on left), announced on Thursday that he would be stepping down as head of the social media company, effective July 1. Jack Dorsey (pictured on right), the company’s chairman and co-founder, has been named interim CEO while the board of directors begins looking for a permanent replacement. Costolo said he would continue to serve on Twitter’s board of directors, while Dorsey […]
Video | Orange’s Boss Meets With Netanyahu Stéphane Richard, the chief executive of Orange, the French telecom giant, tells Israel’s prime minister that he regrets the furor caused by his statements about doing business in the country. By JODI RUDOREN June 12, 2015 JERUSALEM — The chief executive of a French telecommunications company made an extraordinary personal pilgrimage on Friday to apologize to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel, […]
Businesses that need to handle workloads with a range of different demands have a selection of new cloud-based, general-purpose instances to choose from through Amazon Web Services (AWS). AWS on Thursday announced the availability of M4 instances, a next-generation Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) offering. Powered by custom 2.4-GHz Intel Xeon E5-2676 v3 Haswell processors, M4 instances are designed to support a variety of applications, including relational and […]
A broker laughs while speaking to a colleague, as they trade on their computer terminals at a stock brokerage firm in Mumbai, March 4, 2015. Reuters/Shailesh Andrade/Files MUMBAI Regulators hope plans for a new bourse with less stringent listing requirements will lure a stream of startups in the country’s burgeoning technology industry, looking for a platform to raise capital for expansion. The eased rules, marking a change […]
NEW YORK Twitter Inc (TWTR.N) CEO Dick Costolo is stepping down, under pressure from investors frustrated by the Internet company’s slow growth and seemingly constant shake-ups in its upper ranks. Costolo will be replaced by co-founder Jack Dorsey on an interim basis. The company’s shares rose 7.7 percent to $38.60 in after-market trading. “Unfortunately this news isn’t surprising,” said Nate Elliott of management consultant Forrester Research. “The […]
UAE. Dubai private sector companies indicated a modest rebound in output growth from the 18-month low recorded during April, according to the latest Emirates NBD Dubai Economy Tracker™ report. The latest survey also pointed to a slightly faster expansion of incoming new work, while modest job creation and positive sentiment regarding the business outlook was sustained. Of the three key sub-sectors monitored by the survey, construction was […]
UAE. Invesco today released its third annual Invesco Global Sovereign Asset Management Study[1], an in-depth report on the complex investment behaviour of sovereign wealth funds, conducted amongst more than 50 individual sovereign investors across the globe representing $7.09 trillion2 of assets, including Middle East based sovereign wealth funds. This year’s study took place against a backdrop of an extreme fall in the price of oil and provides […]
UAE. Economic Insight: Middle East Q2 2015 is produced by Cebr, ICAEW’s partner and economic forecaster. Commissioned by ICAEW, the report provides a snapshot of the region’s economic performance. The report undertakes a quarterly review of the Middle East, focusing on the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) member countries (United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait), as well as Egypt, Iran, Iraq, Jordan and Lebanon […]
Emirates Airline President Tim Clark said Tuesday that if the U.S. were to void its open skies policy on aviation traffic rights, then antitrust immunity granted to some U.S. and European airlines to coordinate trans-Atlantic flying would also have to disappear. “If you have an open skies regime, you can get [antitrust immunity, or ATI]. If you shut down open skies, ATI has to go out because […]
Al Hilal Bank opens new branch in Masdar City ABU DHABI, 6 days ago Al Hilal Bank has inaugurated its new brand in the Masdar City, a mixed-use project being developed in Abu Dhabi which is envisioned to emerge as a sustainable eco-city. The branch aims at highlighting Al Hilal Bank’s commitment to introducing products, services and facilities that are environmentally friendly and powered by state-of-the-art technology. […]
A 3D plastic representation of the Facebook logo is seen in this illustration in Zenica, Bosnia and Herzegovina, May 13, 2015. Reuters/Dado Ruvic NEW YORK Overseas markets bring in more advertising revenue than the United States for Facebook Inc, amounting to 51 percent of global ad sales in the first quarter, with growth in Asia the fastest in the world at 57 percent, company executives told Reuters. […]
UAE. The European football market grew to total $28.9 billion in 2013/14. Revenue growth across all of the ‘big five’ European leagues (Bundesliga, La Liga, Ligue 1, Premier League and Serie A), saw the combined revenues of the ‘big five’ leagues pass the $15 billion mark ($15.3bn), according to the 24th Annual Review of Football Finance from the Sports Business Group at Deloitte. Dan Jones, Partner in […]
Cisco appoints new MD for Mideast operations MANAMA, 3 days ago Cisco has appointed Ziad Salameh as managing director to lead its Gulf (Oman, Kuwait and Bahrain), Levant, Pakistan and Iraq region and Middle East services. Salameh’s focus will be on driving growth for Cisco as it supports Middle East countries in building a robust national broadband infrastructure, said a report in the Gulf Daily News (GDN), […]
Political unrest dents business confidence in region DUBAI, 3 days ago Political turmoil and instability in the region have led to a drop in business confidence in the UAE and Middle East in the first quarter (Q1) of 2015, according to a new survey of finance professionals. The Global Economic Conditions Survey for the first quarter of 2015, carried out by ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified […]
BAHRAIN. Fitch Ratings has downgraded Bahrain’s Long-term foreign currency Issuer Default Rating(IDR) to ‘BBB-‘ from ‘BBB’ and Long-term local currency IDR to ‘BBB’ from ‘BBB+’. The Outlooks are Stable. The issue ratings on Bahrain’s senior unsecured foreign and local currency bonds have also been downgraded to ‘BBB-‘ from ‘BBB’ and ‘BBB’ from ‘BBB+’, respectively. The agency has simultaneously affirmed Bahrain’s Country Ceiling at ‘BBB+’ and Short-term foreign […]
UAE. The Global Economic Conditions Survey for the first quarter of 2015, carried out by ACCA (the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants) and IMA (the Institute of Management Accountants) also shows that while lower oil prices have helped oil-importing nations such as the USA and Europe, they have undermined performance in many net oil-exporting regions such as Asia Pacific and the Middle East. Confidence has dipped in […]
UAE. According to a new report by The Boston Consulting Group (BCG), the UAE outperforms the GCC and the rest of the world in most dimensions – including income, employment, health, education, infrastructure, income equality, civil society, governance, and environment – when it comes to its current-level Sustainable Economic Development Assessment (SEDA) scores. Across these dimensions, the UAE topped the average scores of both the GCC and […]
UAE. In a report released today by A.T. Kearney the UAE is ranked as the seventh most-attractive country in the Global Retail Development Index (GRDI), marking the eighth year in a row that the country has been globally ranked in the top 10. The UAE’s retail market continues to grow steadily with retail space growing by 7 percent in 2014 to reach 1.6 million square meters and […]
|By TAP Staff| Etihad has formally submitted a document to the United States government rebutting allegations by U.S. carriers that it receives unfair subsidies. The airline announced the filing Tuesday. It is the airline’s most comprehensive response yet to American carriers’ effort to pressure Washington to renegotiate agreements that allow airlines from Qatar and the UAE to fly to the U.S. U.S. airlines have criticized Etihad and […]