Tech News
LEAP 2024: World’s Most-Attended Tech Event Returns to Riyadh with Sharpened Focus on Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI)
Organisers of LEAP 2024, the seismic technology event conceived to accelerate the adoption of technology and aid the ongoing transformation and diversification of Saudi Arabia’s burgeoning economy, are predicting a record-breaking turnout of more than 172,000 visitors when the multi-award-winning event’s third edition gets underway on March 4 at the Riyadh Exhibition and Convention Center, Malham.
The four-day show, already a key enabler in driving monumental economic development and societal change in Saudi Arabia, will this year sharpen its focus on Generative Artificial Intelligence (GAI). To support this, DeepFest, co-located with LEAP and held in partnership with the Saudi Data & Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA), is back and bigger than ever, with over 120 companies already confirmed to participate. The 2024 edition will unveil government AI initiatives and the latest innovations by incorporating a thought-leadership conference and a series of sector-dedicated tracks, trainings, live demos, innovation sessions, start-up pitches, and an exhibition that features the world’s top tech companies from across the world who are driving AI forward.
Investment and deal generation set to eclipse US$9bn
After the incomparable success of LEAP 2023, where on-event investment deals totalled more than US$9bn, organiser Tahaluf – a joint venture between Informa PLC, the Saudi Federation for Cybersecurity, Programming and Drones (SAFCSP) and Events Investment Fund – predicted LEAP 2024 will continue rewriting tech industry event records.
Organised in partnership with the Saudi Ministry for Communications and Information Technology (MCIT), LEAP 2024 visitor numbers are already on track to surpass the 172,000 attendees achieved last February – a feat that saw LEAP’s second outing confirmed as the world’s most-attended tech event.
Michael Champion, CEO of Tahaluf, said: “In line with our goal to echo the spirit and build on the successes of our previous editions, LEAP 2024 will venture beyond imagined horizons. With a laser focus on AI, its myriad applications, and transformative advancements, LEAP 2024 is a continuation that will catapult the global tech industry into an elevated realm that is overflowing with untapped potential and unique experiences.”
With a new venue to increase capacity, LEAP 2024 will host more than 1,000 exhibitors displaying and demonstrating innovative tech breakthroughs to propel society into new worlds of living and working. An assortment of 1,000-plus international and regional experts will contribute to 25 content tracks, spotlighting next-gen tech frontiers, while seven new content features – dedicated to AI, Sustainability, Gaming, Space, Cybersecurity, Future Workforce, and Digital Twins – complete a robust conference and dynamic knowledge-sharing agenda.
Heavyweight names seize massive sponsor exposure and investment potential
LEAP’s unprecedented business power has generated new sponsorship pacts with some of the world’s leading players. With Ericsson, Huawei, Salam, Family Office, Tawuniya, and Elm already onboard as strategic sponsors, Neo Leap has signed up as a diamond sponsor, while Go Telecom, Lenovo, and Schneider Electric, PwC, and Hong Kong Science and Technology Park are all platinum sponsors. Gold sponsorship agreements have been secured with Mastercard, zoom, Cyberani, Cognizant, Arabsat, Deloitte, Perfect Presentation, and Dinar Investment.
Headline-makers in Main Stage ‘Acts’
A star-studded contingent of 130 headline-making celebrities and C-suite changemakers feature on LEAP’s Main Stage speaker platform, where discussions will follow a four ‘act’ format – Impulse, Accelerate, Momentum, and LEAP – aligned with ideation, business, and personal growth.
“The keynote stage will bring inspiring insights into the exciting evolution of the tech ecosystem and its role in humanity, security, and well-being,” added Champion. “This line-up will feature international tech leaders, global enterprises, policymakers, superstar athletes, and everything in between. Together, they will explore how exponential tech is expanding the social security sector and identify opportunities for shaping digital rights for the wellbeing of this and the next generation.”
Among the confirmed keynote cast to date are Angela Kane, Vice President and former UN High Representative for Disarmament Affairs, International Institute for Peace – Vienna; Elizabeth Adams, Affiliate Fellow and Former Chief AI Ethics and Culture Advisor, Standford Institute for Human-Centered AI; Divya Gokulnath, Co-founder, Byju’s; Martin Vilig, Co-founder, Bolt; Borje Ekholm, CEO and President, Ericsson; Arvind Krishna, CEO, IBM; Martin Urrutia Islas, Global Head of Retail Innovation and Experience, The Lego Group; Philippe Rambach, Chief AI Office, Schneider Electric; Nicholas Dirks, President, The New York Academy of Sciences; Ott Velsberg, Government Chief Data Officer, Republic of Estonia; and Dr Anna Zeiter, VP – Chief Privacy Officer and Associate General Counsel of Privacy, Data and AI at eBay.
Tech News
PNY ANNOUNCES STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP WITH F5 TO ACCELERATE THE ADOPTION OF SECURE, HIGH-PERFORMANCE INFRASTRUCTURE IN EMEA

PNY Technologies, a leading distributor of technology solutions and long-standing NVIDIA partner, today announced a partnership with F5, the global leader in delivering and securing
This agreement aims to strengthen access for enterprises across the EMEA region to advanced solutions designed to optimise, secure, and accelerate applications and IT infrastructures.
As AI adoption continues to accelerate, performance, data flow management, and application security are becoming critical priorities. Through this partnership, the F5 Application Delivery and Security Platform (ADSP) will complement PNY’s AI Factory ecosystem by providing advanced capabilities for traffic management, application security, and performance optimisation across on-premises, cloud, and hybrid environments.
PNY will leverage its technical expertise, partner network, and logistics capabilities to facilitate the deployment of F5 ADSP solutions for enterprises, system integrators, and service providers throughout the region.
“Collaboration between PNY, a specialist distributor of NVIDIA AI Factory solutions across the EMEA region, and F5 represents a major step forward for AI-dedicated infrastructure,” said Laurent Chapoulaud, VP Marketing at PNY. “Together, we optimise GPU environments through accelerated data flows and enhanced application security. This synergy between infrastructure and intelligent traffic management enables the deployment of AI architectures that are high-performance, resilient, and scalable.”
“This partnership brings together complementary strengths that directly benefit our partners and customers,” said Nasser El Abdouli, Regional VP EMEA Channel Sales, F5. “PNY’s longstanding partnership with NVIDIA, combined with F5’s growing AI-focused application delivery and security offerings, allows us to help partners capably respond to the rapidly increasing demand for secure and scalable AI infrastructure across EMEA.”
Through this collaboration, PNY and F5 aim to support enterprises in their strategic initiatives related to hybrid multicloud, cybersecurity, and application performance optimisation, while simplifying access to next-generation technologies.
Tech News
MIDDLE EAST CONFLICT DRIVING A SURGE IN SCAMS, DEEPFAKES, AND GOVERNMENT IMPERSONATION

Cybercriminals don’t wait for the dust to settle. As conflict escalates across the Middle East, a parallel threat has emerged targeting ordinary people through their inboxes and social media feeds.
On 4 March, the UAE Ministry of Interior warned the public about fraudulent emails impersonating government emergency services, falsely claiming that residents must complete a mandatory registration form to receive state support or insurance coverage. The emails bore hallmarks of official government communications, making them convincingly deceptive. They are designed to exploit fear, urgency, and the instinct to comply with perceived authority. These messages are already circulating.
Alongside financial scams, verified fact-checkers have identified AI-generated and mislabelled footage circulating online as supposed evidence of attacks in the UAE. This includes video from Bahrain that was picked up by international media outlets and incorrectly broadcast as a Dubai drone strike. Fabricated videos of the Burj Khalifa collapsing, AI-generated missile strike imagery, and decade-old footage repackaged as current events have also circulated widely. In another example, a supposed “before and after” satellite image of Dubai showing smoke rising over the city was mislabelled — the image was actually from Sharjah, the neighbouring emirate. In many cases, the content spread faster than the corrections. Dubai Police have warned that sharing unverified information can carry criminal penalties under UAE law, including fines of no less than AED 200,000. Despite these warnings, the flow of misleading content has not slowed.
KnowBe4 warns patterns observed during previous conflicts and crises, including the war in Ukraine and the COVID-19 pandemic, the public should also expect charity and donation scams exploiting humanitarian concern, phishing emails disguised as embassy or government alerts, and deepfake imagery engineered to provoke fear or spread disinformation.
Dr. Martin Kraemer, CISO Advisor at KnowBe4 said, “Crises are the most reliable recruitment tool bad actors have. When people are frightened and searching for information, they are not necessarily looking for the truth. They are looking for confirmation of what they already fear. That is exactly what scammers and disinformation actors exploit. What we are seeing right now, fake government emergency emails, mislabelled footage, AI-generated imagery, is not random. It is targeted, and it is designed to exploit the gap between what people feel and what they know. The antidote is not panic. It is discipline: pause, question the source, and go directly to official channels before acting on anything. That’s precisely how governments and organizations are educating people to react in stressful situations.”
What the Public Can Do Right Now
KnowBe4 urges residents, travellers, and anyone following events in the region to apply the following principles:
- Treat urgency as a warning sign. Any message that pressures you to act quickly, register now, donate immediately, confirm your details before midnight, is likely designed to stop you thinking clearly.
- Verify before you share. Before forwarding footage or information, check whether it has been verified by a reputable news outlet or official source. Reverse image searches take seconds and can prevent significant harm.
- Go directly to official sources. If you receive communications claiming to be from a government ministry, embassy, or emergency service, navigate directly to their official website rather than clicking any link in the message.
- Question what you see. AI-generated imagery has reached a level of quality where video alone is no longer reliable evidence. Look for verification from multiple credible sources before drawing conclusions.
- Report suspicious communications. In the UAE, suspected scam emails or messages should be reported to the relevant authorities. Do not engage with the sender.
Tech News
ALTERYX ACCELERATES ITS NEXT PHASE OF GROWTH WITH AI-READY DATA AND AUTOMATION AT ENTERPRISE SCALE

Alteryx a leading AI-ready data and analytics company, has announced its next phase of growth, surpassing $1 billion in ARR and powering more than 380 million automated workflows annually. As enterprises shift from AI experimentation to full-scale execution, demand for trusted automation and AI-ready data has never been higher. With Alteryx One, organizations are operationalizing AI responsibly and accelerating enterprise-scale decision-making.
Enterprises continue to invest heavily in AI, with 89% planning to maintain or increase spending in 2026, as generative and agentic AI technologies promise a transformative impact. Yet trust remains a critical barrier: 28% of organizations report limited or no confidence in the accuracy and quality of their data. In the UAE alone, 94% of data leaders say they lack complete visibility into AI decision-making processes. Reliable data and repeatable workflows have become the foundation for operationalizing AI successfully.
To address these challenges, Alteryx One brings together this strategy — a single platform trusted by thousands of customers that connects data, business context, and AI for insights.
Scaling AI and Automation with Alteryx One
McKinsey & Company puts AI adoption at ~84% across surveyed orgs in the Middle East region. Against this backdrop, data remains the defining factor. As per Alteryx research, nearly half (49%) of leaders cite high-quality, accessible, and well-governed data as the top requirement for AI to reach its full potential. To meet this, Alteryx One provides a trusted logic layer, a governed, repeatable workflow that captures business logic, preserves lineage, and produces AI-ready outputs.
Adoption of Alteryx One is accelerating, with thousands of customers upgrading to the new, simplified edition pricing model, making it easier to access advanced AI and automation capabilities. Built-in enterprise security and governance provide the controls organizations need to scale. By seamlessly connecting to enterprise data sources, AI models, and business applications, Alteryx One delivers trusted, governed data wherever it’s needed.
Andy MacMillan, CEO of Alteryx, said: “When automation becomes agentic, inconsistency is no longer just inefficient. It becomes an enterprise risk. AI requires a governed and repeatable logic layer. Without that foundation, organizations don’t just move faster — they scale risk faster than productivity. Alteryx is purpose-built for this next phase, giving enterprises the control, transparency, and confidence to operationalize AI, and giving lines of business the flexibility they need to adapt and change.”
In 2025, Alteryx also celebrated 10 years of its global Community, which now includes more than 750,000 members worldwide. Community members have shared thousands of peer-driven solutions, workflows, and best practices, helping organizations accelerate onboarding, scale analytics initiatives faster, and maximize the value of Alteryx One.
Automation at Enterprise Scale
The need for reliable, scalable automation has never been more evident. In 2025, Alteryx customers executed more than 380 million automated workflows, up from more than 260 million in 2023, highlighting how organizations are moving beyond experimentation to governed, enterprise-wide automation that operationalizes analytics.
Alteryx enables organizations to extend automation into new generative AI use cases while maintaining explainable, auditable outputs aligned with enterprise compliance standards. Users can interact with data using natural language, accelerate model development, and embed AI-driven insights directly into trusted workflows — helping organizations scale innovation without sacrificing control.
Business Performance
In 2025, the company surpassed $1 billion in ARR, signaling strong enterprise adoption and long-term customer commitment. Alteryx was also recognized in G2’s 2026 Best Software Awards for Best Analytics Software Products.
In parallel, Alteryx has expanded its cloud data platform ecosystem, including a deepened partnership with Google Cloud that enables customers to work directly with cloud-scale data and accelerate analytics and AI initiatives in modern cloud environments.
The company also introduced a refreshed brand identity reflecting its evolution into a unified platform for AI-powered analytics and enterprise-scale automation. With Alteryx One at the center, the company is redefining how enterprises scale AI and automation responsibly, providing the trusted foundation needed to drive intelligent outcomes.
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