Tech News
Dubai student Rahul Nambiar to expand his award-winning EdTech Startup, Jochi, to Dubai and beyond
Jochi is planning to expand in the UAE and the GCC.
Jochi, was founded in late 2021, and was designed to support students with learning differences like dyslexia and ADHD, a growing problem caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Its newest concept, 360 by Jochi – an all-in-one progress monitoring tool that enables educators to go from data to decisions in minutes – helps teachers enhance learning and support with real-time insights on student performance.
“After successfully developing, testing and commissioning Jochi, we are currently planning to expand our platform with a preliminary focus on Dubai, UAE and the Gulf,” Rahul Nambiar, Co-Founder and Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Jochi, says.
Rahul Nambiar, who lived most of his life in Dubai, UAE, says Jochi can help educators, students, and educational institutions to revolutionise their programming with data-driven confidence. “Dubai, where I grew up and studied, is the most advanced education market in the Middle East and it is also one of the most dynamic education sectors that is evolving through innovation and technology. The UAE Government has deployed significant resources in education, technology and innovation that are going to improve learning – directly transforming the country into a major education, technology and innovation hub. That’s why we would like our business to grow internationally from Dubai, UAE to the rest of the Middle East.”
More than 326,000 students study in 216 K-12 schools in Dubai, according to the Knowledge and Human Development Authority (KHDA), the emirate’s education sector regulator.
Jochi started in 2021 by Yash Dhir and Rahul Nambiar – freshmen at the University of Pennsylvania. They started looking at ways to improve the learning experience for high-school students in the US. In response to first-hand experiences addressing the pandemic’s impact on support for neurodiverse students, Jochi 1.0 was born, with a focus on improving the learning outcomes for students with learning differences.
In their fourth year, Yash Dhir and Rahul Nambiar were awarded the University of Pennsylvania President’s Innovation Prize to continue their work post-graduation. They are scheduled to receive $100,000 in grant funding for the company, and a $50,000 living stipend each. In addition, Jochi will have a workplace in the Pennovation Center, University of Pennsylvania’s business incubator.
Rahul Nambiar studied in the Cambridge International School in Dubai where he topped the school for the GCSE exams. Following his GCSE exams, he went to boarding school in the UK prior to joining the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League institution in the US.
As an undergraduate, Rahul served as a Teaching Assistant for a graduate-level courses, further demonstrating his technical and academic skills. Rahul graduated from the University of Pennsylvania with High Honours and was a 2024 Presidential Fellow. Rahul gained practical experience through internships at Rhombus and the National Basketball Association (NBA), where he worked as a Software Engineer.
“Our early success sparked a bigger question: what if every decision made by educators was informed by deep insights that were personalised down to each student? This vision became Jochi’s mission, transforming how schools leverage data to drive meaningful change. Today, we’re dedicated to helping schools make sense of their data, ensuring resources are directed where they’ll have the greatest impact on student outcomes,” he says.
Jochi has raised US$280,000 through grants from the University of Pennsylvania already. In addition to the President’s Innovation Prize, Jochi won $30,000 from the 2024 Venture Lab Startup Challenge, a competition for the top performing startups at the University of Pennsylvania and Pennsylvania region. These prizes came from the University of Pennsylvania’s accelerator, and the Wharton School of Business. Jochi also won an additional $50,000 in grant funding from the Draper Foundation, a leading investment firm run by the legendary American investor, Tim Draper. Outside of funding, this award offers Jochi and Rahul direct access to the Draper Foundation’s network and resources.
Jochi’s next step is in the world of artificial intelligence. “Our goal is to use artificial intelligence to streamline the everyday responsibilities of educators so that they can refocus their attention where it’s needed the most – supporting students. By simplifying educators’ understanding and access to data with AI, we can transform the level of personalized support each student needs to unlock their unique potential. Technology can never replace the impact educators have on their students, but it can be an incredibly powerful assistive tool.”
Tech News
Submer to Address the Infrastructure Challenges Behind Sovereign AI at DCD Connect | MENA 2026
Submer, a full-stack AI and HPC data centre infrastructure provider, will join industry leaders at DCD Connect | MENA 2026, taking place October 26–27 at Grand Hyatt Dubai, to discuss the infrastructure strategies needed to advance sovereign AI across the region.
As governments and organisations across the Middle East accelerate their sovereign AI and cloud strategies, the challenge extends beyond keeping data within national borders. They must also build the high-performance computing infrastructure needed to support increasingly complex AI workloads while meeting regulatory requirements, scaling efficiently and maintaining commercial viability.
Submer will contribute to this discussion through its participation in the panel debate “Building Sovereign AI: Enabling Innovation Through Scalable Compute,” on October 26, from 2:30 p.m. to 3:15 p.m. The session will explore the infrastructure requirements of sovereign cloud environments, the trade-offs between fully localised and hybrid infrastructure models, and how the region can develop a sovereign-ready compute backbone without compromising flexibility, performance or return on investment.

Bahaa Al Janabi, Technical and Solution Lead for Middle East, Turkey and Africa at Submer, will join fellow industry experts to examine how infrastructure decisions can shape the region’s ability to turn its AI ambitions into scalable, commercially viable deployments.
“Sovereign AI is not simply about where data resides. It is about having the infrastructure to run advanced AI workloads at scale while meeting national requirements and making the economics work. The choices organisations make today will shape their ability to innovate, scale and compete. We look forward to discussing how the right infrastructure strategies can help turn the region’s sovereign AI ambitions into reality,” said Bahaa Al Janabi.
Submer representatives will also be available throughout the event to meet with customers, partners and industry stakeholders and discuss the evolving AI infrastructure landscape across the Middle East, Africa and Turkey.
Tech News
Thermax showcases advanced desalination and water recovery technologies to strengthen UAE’s industrial water security at WETEX 2026
Thermax Limited showcased its advanced seawater desalination and industrial water recovery technologies at the Water, Energy, Technology and Environment Exhibition 2026 (WETEX), held from October 20 to 22 at Dubai World Trade Centre. Through its digital showcase, the company highlighted solutions designed to help industries secure reliable water supplies, improve resource efficiency and reduce environmental impact.
Thermax’s participation came as Dubai continues to strengthen its desalination infrastructure to meet growing water requirements. According to Dubai Electricity and Water Authority (DEWA) Financial Annual Report, desalinated water production increased by 5.51 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2026, reaching a record 37.57 billion imperial gallons. By June 2026, Dubai’s installed desalination capacity had reached 555 million imperial gallons per day, with seawater reverse osmosis accounting for 23 per cent of the total. These developments highlight the growing importance of efficient and reliable water infrastructure in supporting the UAE’s evolving water requirements.
At the event, Thermax highlighted its desalination solutions that help industries meet their water needs while easing pressure on freshwater resources. The systems use energy-efficient membrane technology to remove salts from seawater and produce water suitable for industrial use, with designs tailored to each customer’s water quality and operating requirements.
Through its digital showcase, Thermax also highlighted portable and containerised desalination systems that bring key equipment together in compact units. This reduces installation work on site, supports faster deployment and allows treatment capacity to grow with demand.
Ashish Bhandari, Managing Director & CEO, Thermax Limited, said: “Water security shapes where industries invest and how competitively they operate. Businesses need dependable supply at a cost they can sustain. That means planning water and energy together, with investment decisions guided by performance throughout a plant’s life.”
Beyond desalination, Thermax also showcased Advanced Reverse Osmosis (RO) technology that recovers additional usable water from the concentrated stream left after treatment. By concentrating the remaining brine, the technology reduces the load on downstream evaporation systems and supports more efficient industrial wastewater management. When combined with suitable additional treatment and crystallisation processes, it can also support salt recovery, creating opportunities to recover valuable resources from wastewater and promote circular water management.
Thermax also showcased industrial water treatment, wastewater recycling and zero liquid discharge (ZLD) solutions that help industries treat and reuse wastewater for suitable applications while reducing freshwater dependence. Complementing these solutions, Thermax’s EDGE Live digital platform supports plant performance through real-time monitoring, AI-driven analytics and predictive diagnostics, helping industrial operators identify potential issues early, optimise maintenance and improve operational reliability.
These solutions align with the objectives of the UAE Water Security Strategy 2036, which targets 95 per cent reuse of treated water by 2036. Through its regional office in Dubai, Thermax is focused on exploring various opportunities across the UAE’s industrial desalination, water treatment and wastewater recycling sectors, particularly within water-intensive industries such as oil and gas, chemicals, metals, food and beverages, and pharmaceuticals.
Thermax has been active across the Middle East and North Africa region since 1993, with more than 1,000 installations across its regional energy and environment portfolio, serving over 30 industries.
Tech Features
TrendAI™Expands Vision One with New Security Capabilities for AI Agents and Application Development
TrendAI™, the global AI security leader and enterprise business unit of Trend Micro Incorporated (TYO: 4704; TSE: 4704), has announced new capabilities for TrendAI Vision One™. These include the private preview of Autonomous Vulnerability Discovery and expanded support for Claude’s Compliance API, which now covers Claude Code and Cowork sessions. Together, these services help enterprises identify exploitable vulnerabilities in source code before attackers do, investigate how AI agents operate, and maintain oversight as AI adoption scales.
The need for this oversight is growing rapidly across the region. According to research conducted by The Harris Poll for Dataiku, 62% of UAE chief information officers believe their organisation have more than 50 AI agents running in production, yet only 18% have a fully unified view of agents across platforms, data environments, and business applications. At the same time, AI is accelerating both how quickly code is written and how quickly attackers can identify flaws. Security teams therefore need to keep pace with AI adoption without losing visibility into what is happening across their environments.
The new capabilities extend TrendAI Vision One™ across both software development and AI agent activity. TrendAI Vision One™ Autonomous Vulnerability Discovery is powered by AESIR, TrendAI’s agentic exploit-remediation engine, which identifies and validates vulnerabilities, including zero-days. It also verifies fixes in customer source code. The engine uses purpose-built, multi-model AI architecture that relies primarily on Anthropic models and has outperformed single-model and agentic system scores on the CyberGym Leaderboard. Every finding is validated by experts from the TrendAI™ Zero-Day Initiative™ (ZDI), the world’s largest vendor-agnostic bug bounty programme. The Autonomous Vulnerability Discovery is deployed and operated on Amazon Bedrock from Amazon Web Services (AWS), enabling the full workflow to run within the customer’s AWS environment
In parallel, the expanded Claude Compliance API integration brings Claude Code and Cowork session records from Claude Enterprise into TrendAI Vision One™. These records include prompts, responses, and tool calls, each tied to a verified user. It enables security teams to investigate AI activity in context, correlate it with endpoint, identity, cloud and network signals, and build custom detections for relevant agent behaviour.
Commenting on the announcement, Salah Suleiman, Managing Director, South Gulf, TrendAI™, said, “AI is changing both how software is built and how work gets done across the enterprise. Code is being written faster than ever, while AI agents are increasingly able to access systems, call tools and act on behalf of users. As organisations across the UAE and the wider region scale AI at pace, their security teams need to identify vulnerabilities early while maintaining clear visibility into what AI systems are doing and whether their actions align with organisational policies. With these additions to TrendAI Vision One™, we are helping organisations move faster with AI while maintaining the context, oversight and control needed to do so securely.”
TrendAI Vision One™ also continues to ingest activity logs from Claude Enterprise, covering user logins, administrative actions and configuration changes, as well as from Claude Platform, covering administrative, system and resource events. Autonomous Vulnerability Discovery is now available in private preview to select enterprise customers running on AWS, while Claude’s Compliance API integration in TrendAI Vision One™ is available to TrendAI Vision One™ customers using Claude Enterprise.
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