Dubai Internet City (DIC), one of the largest managed ICT clusters and a member of TECOM Investments, today announced its sponsorship of the International Data Corporation’s (IDC) Middle East Chief Information Officer (CIO) Summit 2008.

To be held from 16-17 March at the Grand Hyatt in Dubai, the IDC Middle East CIO Summit 2008 will bring together CIOs, thought leaders, technology gurus, economists and business strategists to participate in peer-directed discussions on best practices for utilizing technology to drive business value. The event will also feature in-depth studies and international benchmarking to shed light on the future role of the CIO.

Jamal Abdulsalam, Executive Director of DIC, said: ”The Middle East is witnessing a tremendous growth in the Information and Communication Technology sector. Consequently, the position of a CIO has acquired additional significance, bringing with it multi-pronged challenges. Issues such as identifying the essential role of a CIO, the efficient use of technology, and optimizing cost and resource management have taken on a new dimension that require considerable deliberation.

“Our sponsorship of the CIO summit 2008 is in line with the ICT cluster’s leading role in the region and its mandate to develop the necessary knowledge environment and state of the art infrastructure. Our participation will also give a fillip to knowledge based industries and open new horizons for overall progress.”

Set to become one of the largest and most prestigious invitation-only IT networking events ever held in the region, the CIO Summit 2008 has drawn support from global brands such as Cisco, Dell, Etisalat, Intel, Nokia, SAP, Symantec, Injazat, Alcatel Lucent, Fujitsu Siemens, ITS2, McAfee, APC-MGE, and Trend Micro.

According to IDC, IT spending in the Middle East and Africa (MEA) will cross US billion (AED146.8 billion) in 2008, with the six Gulf countries accounting for nearly 23 per cent of the total. Last year, IT spending in the Gulf stood at US.92 billion (AED29 billion). The hardware market’s share was 62.1 per cent, followed by the services sector at 24.3 per cent and packed software at 13.6 per cent.

Compounding the challenges facing the sector is the exponential increase in data generated by business operations. According to preliminary data from IDC, organizations in the Middle East invested in more than 63,000 terabytes of storage capacity in 2007 – more than double the previous year. Industry experts at CIO Summit 2008 will shed light on this issue and offer delegates unique data management techniques.

Hosting most of the Fortune 500 companies as well as more than 1,000 specialised industry leaders from diverse segments of the information and communication technology sectors, Dubai Internet City has emerged as a global ICT hub, while catering to the region’s increasing focus on knowledge-economy.