Tech News
MIDDLE EAST RETAIL REAL ESTATE LEADERS TO RETHINK OPERATING MODELS AMID SECTOR TRANSFORMATION, BCG REPORT FINDS
GCC region’s retail real estate sector is expanding rapidly, but traditional space-centric models are insufficient. A new report by Boston Consulting Group (BCG) titled “Imagining the Future of Retail: Beyond Space” offers a comprehensive examination of the strategic readiness of retail real estate developers across the Middle East.
Drawing on BCG’s project experience and interviews with senior leaders across the GCC’s major mixed-use, retail, entertainment, and lifestyle developments, the report says that the region’s retail real estate sector is witnessing its most ambitious physical expansion in generations, with millions of square meters of gross leasable area (GLA) under development across megaprojects in Riyadh, Jeddah, Dubai, and Doha. In several GCC markets, luxury retail space expansion has already outpaced growth in addressable consumer spending, reshaping sales per square meter and current development strategies. In addition, competition is intensifying as new supply comes online. Up to 25% of revenue at leading assets comes from non-GLA sources. Assets that lack digital and data capabilities may need to evolve to stay relevant in future customer journeys.
“The forces reshaping retail are converging faster than most operators recognize, and traditional space-centric models are no longer sufficient for what lies ahead,” said Andrea Pierobon, Partner at BCG Middle East. “The GCC has built world-class retail destinations, and the opportunity now is to rethink what retail real estate actually delivers in terms of moving from space-centric models to capability-led approaches.”
Factors Transforming the Traditional Retail Operating Model
The report identifies five converging forces that are systematically transforming traditional retail operating models. Retailers are reducing store size and numbers, opening smaller formats, and experimenting with new space as online commerce grows. The omnichannel imperative means retailers and developers can no longer treat digital and physical as separate strategies. Experience-led consumption is fundamentally shifting what consumers expect from physical retail environments, demanding immersive engagement rather than transactional convenience.
Retail media monetization represents an emerging value stream that most GCC operators have yet to capture, with global retail media revenues forecast to grow by $213 billion by 2028. AI-powered discovery is transforming how consumers navigate their shopping journeys, with more than half of consumers under 34 already using AI tools as part of their purchasing decisions.
BCG outlines three disruption scenarios (not predictions) that retail real estate leaders must actively plan for now:
- What if: over 50% of retail sales move online, fundamentally challenging the economics of traditional mall development, as we see in advanced markets around the world
- What if: Data replaces product margins as the primary value driver, shifting power toward operators who can capture and monetize customer intelligence, as we already see with many leading global retailers
- What if: AI agents become the primary decision-makers in consumer journeys, disintermediating traditional brand and retailer relationships, as we see adoption of Gen AI and Agentic tools accelerating.
Three Archetypes, One Imperative
The analysis also identifies three distinct strategic archetypes emerging across GCC retail real estate, each requiring a different operating model, capital allocation strategy, and capability set. Community and convenience retail serve localized, high-frequency needs with efficiency and accessibility at its core. Experience-led destinations compete on immersive engagement, cultural programming, and social connection rather than transactional retail alone. Ecosystem platform developers position themselves as orchestrators of broader consumer and commercial ecosystems, capturing value through data, partnerships, and integrated services.
“There is an immediate opportunity to shape the next chapter of GCC retail real estate, and to innovate for future retail needs, rather than continuing with the traditional development model,” said Andy Veitch, Managing Director & Partner and Head of Consumer Practice, BCG Middle East. “Those who act decisively, by choosing a clear archetype, investing selectively in enabling capabilities, and shifting from space delivery to business model innovation, will define the category for the next generation.”
The report outlines future-proofing levers that operators must activate: redefining the value proposition, repositioning the tenant mix, creating experiential programming, building data and analytics capabilities, developing retail media offerings, enabling omnichannel integration, investing in sustainability and ESG, forging strategic partnerships, and transforming organizational capabilities.
However, the report reveals that most organizations remain tied to more traditional leasing models, siloed functions, and occupancy-led KPIs. Without targeted investment in data and analytic capabilities, customer experience design, and agile decision-making infrastructure, progress against these imperatives will remain uneven.
Tech News
HISENSE INAUGURATES NEW REGIONAL HEADQUARTERS IN DUBAI INTERNET CITY AND UNVEILS NEXT-GENERATION RGB MINILED TV SERIES
Hisense, a leading brand in global consumer electronics and home appliances, inaugurated its new Middle East & Africa regional headquarters in Building 13, Dubai Internet City, the Middle East’s leading tech hub and part of TECOM Group. The newly designed headquarters reflects Hisense’s innovation-driven culture, featuring a contemporary environment built to foster collaboration, creativity, and technological advancement.
The new headquarters reinforces Hisense’s long-term commitment to the Middle East and Africa, establishing a strategic hub to strengthen the company’s growing operations, partnerships, and innovation initiatives across the region. The milestone event brought together distinguished guests including Dubai Internet City’s top management and Hisense’s key partners, distributors, and main retailers across the region.
“The opening of our new office in Dubai Internet City represents our commitment to the UAE market and the broader Middle East region,” said Jason Ou, President at Hisense Middle East & Africa. “With the launch of our new UR9 and UR8 RGB MiniLED Series, we are bringing the most advanced display technology available to consumers here, delivering an unparalleled viewing experience that sets a new benchmark for premium home entertainment.”
“Dubai Internet City is home to a diverse community of global technology companies and more than 31,000 professionals that continue to advance the digital economy in the region and globally,” said Ammar Al Malik, Executive Vice President of Commercial at TECOM Group and Managing Director of Dubai Internet City. “Hisense’s new regional headquarters reflects its long-term commitment to the region and underscores Dubai’s position as a global hub for innovation, in line with the objectives of Dubai Economic Agenda ‘D33’.”
Dubai has been home to Hisense’s regional HQ for many years and continues to play a key role in the company’s growth across the Middle East and Africa. The UAE’s commitment to innovation, supportive business environment, and wealth of opportunities has made it an ideal strategic hub for regional expansion.
The inauguration also served as the platform for Hisense to unveil its most advanced television technology to date: the UR9 and UR8 RGB MiniLED Series. Designed to capture every thrilling moment of live sports and entertainment, the flagship models deliver stunning detail, vibrant colours, and true-to-life picture quality that brings fans closer to the action from their own homes. As an Official Sponsor of the FIFA World Cup 26™ and a proud supporter of the first-ever Sensory Inclusive FIFA World Cup™, Hisense is helping create dedicated sensory spaces across all host stadiums, ensuring more people can enjoy the world’s biggest football tournament.
Powered by next-generation MiniLEDs, the technology delivers more accurate and vibrant colours, higher brightness, and deeper contrast, while reducing blue light exposure and optimizing power consumption.
Leading the range, the UR9 Series represents Hisense’s most advanced expression of RGB MiniLED innovation. Delivering what the company calls “Natural and Real Color,” the UR9 achieves authentic and vivid colour reproduction with exceptional brightness and contrast performance. The technology produces more natural skin tones and lifelike imagery, creating visuals that are not only striking but also comfortable for extended everyday viewing.
The UR8 Series extends the benefits of RGB MiniLED technology to a broader audience, offering high-performance displays across screen sizes ranging from 55 to 100 inches. Combining vibrant colour accuracy, impressive brightness, eye-friendly viewing, and energy-efficient performance, the series brings premium large-screen entertainment to more consumers across the region.
At Hisense, the belief in “Innovating a Brighter Life” inspires the company to develop technologies and experiences that make everyday life better and bring people closer to the moments that matter.
Unveiled in 1999, Dubai Internet City has nurtured the digital economy by uniting global leaders through its world-class ecosystem. According to an impact study conducted by the district in partnership with Accenture in February 2025, Dubai Internet City contributed AED 100 billion to Dubai’s GDP in the past 15 years.
Tech News
UIPATH INTRODUCES MAESTRO CASE TO ORCHESTRATE DYNAMIC, EXCEPTION-HEAVY BUSINESS PROCESSES ACROSS THE ENTERPRISE

UiPath, Inc. (NYSE: PATH), a leader in business orchestration and automation, today announced Maestro Case, a new AI-native UiPath agentic case management capability. Available today as part of the UiPath Maestro™ business orchestration capabilities, Maestro Case extends governed orchestration and automation to complex and exception-laden case management, allowing enterprises to manage dynamic, long-running cases with greater visibility, control, and execution speed.
In a recent UiPath survey of nearly 600 C-Suite and IT practitioners at large companies ($1B+ in revenue), 52% reported that the presence of hybrid workflows—a combination of static, repeatable processes and dynamic, context-dependent processes—across their day-to-day operations. Those dynamic processes, such as customer requests, investigations, and approvals, are managed through disconnected emails, spreadsheets, and point solutions, creating delays, inconsistent outcomes, and limited visibility.
Without a coordinated view of a case, with people, systems, data, and AI agents in a single workflow, it becomes difficult to ensure the right actions occur at the right time. Additionally, the valuable context of those actions can be lost as the case moves through teams and the organization, impacting resolution speed, compliance, and transparency, making it harder to scale operations without increasing complexity.
Maestro Case is designed for enterprises living in hybrid environments that need more than orchestrating defined paths. As a new capability with UiPath Maestro, Maestro Case treats the case as a dynamic business entity that carries its data, participants, timeline, and execution context across stages, actors, and systems. Configurable case and stage management agents help move work forward, while robots, AI agents, and people execute tasks within governed workflows. Human review and escalation can be built into the process for exceptions, compliance needs, and decisions requiring judgment. Additionally, as an AI-native offering, Maestro Case is fully supported by any coding agent of choice across every stage of a case, including build, test, debug, deploy, and operate.
“Modern case management is no longer about tracking work—it’s about orchestrating dynamic complex processes, where exceptions are the norm,” said Raghu Malpani, Chief Technology & Product Officer, UiPath. “With Maestro Case, organizations can bring together people, AI agents, systems, and business processes into a single coordinated experience. Teams can resolve complex cases faster, adapt to changing business needs, and deliver the visibility, governance, and agility required in today’s enterprise environment.”
Early design adopters are already seeing measurable results, reporting a 60–80% reduction in average case handling time, a three-to-five times increase in cases resolved without human intervention, and SLA compliance improvements of more than 25 percentage points. One financial services adopter projects more than $12 million in annual savings from leveraging Maestro Case to automate dispute resolution and KYC case workflows.
Tech News
LINKSHADOW ACCELERATES AFRICAN EXPANSION THROUGH STRATEGIC DISTRIBUTION PARTNERSHIP WITH REDINGTON
LinkShadow, a leading AI-powered cybersecurity company, today announced a strategic pan-African distribution partnership with Redington, a leading technology aggregator and innovation catalyst. The collaboration marks a significant milestone in LinkShadow’s global growth strategy and will enable enterprises across Africa to strengthen cyber resilience through advanced threat detection, data security, and identity protection capabilities.
As organizations across Africa rapidly embrace cloud computing, artificial intelligence, digital banking, smart infrastructure, and connected services, cyber risk has emerged as one of the most critical business challenges facing enterprises today. The increasing sophistication of cyberattacks, coupled with expanding digital footprints and evolving regulatory requirements, is driving demand for intelligent, scalable, and integrated cybersecurity solutions that can provide visibility across increasingly complex environments.
Through this partnership, Redington will leverage its extensive regional channel ecosystem and market reach to bring LinkShadow’s next-generation cybersecurity platform to enterprises, government entities, critical infrastructure providers, and managed security service providers (MSSPs) across the continent. Together, the two organizations will empower customers to proactively identify threats, reduce security blind spots, accelerate incident response, and strengthen overall cyber resilience.
Founded with a vision to transform how organizations detect and respond to cyber threats, LinkShadow initially pioneered AI-driven Network Detection and Response (NDR) capabilities that provided deep visibility into network activity and threat behavior. LinkShadow is positioned in the Visionaries Quadrant in the 2026 Gartner® Magic Quadrant™ for NDR, further reinforcing its commitment to innovation and its ability to help organizations address evolving cybersecurity challenges. As enterprise attack surfaces expanded, the company broadened its cybersecurity portfolio to include Data Security Posture Management (DSPM), enabling organizations to discover, classify, monitor, and protect sensitive data across hybrid and multi-cloud environments. Recognizing the growing prevalence of identity-centric attacks, LinkShadow further introduced Identity Threat Detection and Response (ITDR), helping organizations mitigate identity compromise, privilege abuse, insider threats, and account takeover risks.
Today, these capabilities converge within CyberMeshX (CMX), LinkShadow’s next-generation cyber intelligence platform. CMX unifies network, data, and identity security into a single adaptive framework that delivers contextual visibility, AI-powered threat correlation, and actionable intelligence across the entire enterprise environment. By breaking down traditional security silos and integrating seamlessly with existing security investments, CMX enables organizations to build a more connected, resilient, and future-ready cybersecurity architecture.
“Trust has become one of the most valuable currencies of the digital economy,” said Jim Mathew, President, Africa & Egypt, Redington. “As organizations across Africa continue to invest in cloud, AI, and connected digital services, cybersecurity must remain at the heart of that journey. Through our partnership with LinkShadow, we are empowering our ecosystem with the intelligence, visibility, and expertise needed to support sustainable digital growth across the continent.”
“As cyber threats become more sophisticated, organizations need security platforms that not only detect threats but also provide the intelligence needed to respond quickly and effectively,” said Hishamul Hasheel, Vice President, Software Solutions Group, Africa, Redington. “By bringing LinkShadow into our cybersecurity portfolio, we are enabling partners throughout our regional ecosystem to deliver advanced threat detection and security analytics capabilities that help customers improve resilience, strengthen operations, and secure their digital transformation initiatives.”
Africa’s cybersecurity market continues to experience significant growth, fueled by increasing digital adoption, cloud-first initiatives, expanding critical infrastructure projects, and heightened awareness of cyber risk at the boardroom level. As organizations modernize operations and embrace emerging technologies, the demand for unified, intelligence-driven cybersecurity solutions continues to accelerate.
“Redington’s appointment as LinkShadow’s Distributor for Africa is a significant step in expanding our channel-led growth across the region. With Redington’s strong partner ecosystem, market reach and value-added distribution capabilities, we will enable more partners to deliver LinkShadow’s AI CyberMesh Platform for Digital Trust to enterprises and governments, helping them strengthen cyber resilience and address evolving threats across Africa,” said Sajin Yousuff Kutty, Chief Partner Officer at LinkShadow.
As threat actors increasingly leverage automation, artificial intelligence, and sophisticated attack techniques to evade traditional defenses, organizations require cybersecurity platforms capable of correlating signals across network, data, and identity layers in real time. LinkShadow’s AI-driven architecture empowers security teams with deeper context, accelerated threat investigations, and improved operational efficiency, enabling them to respond faster and more effectively to emerging threats.
The partnership underscores LinkShadow’s continued investment in high-growth international markets and reinforces both organizations’ commitment to advancing cybersecurity innovation, digital trust, and cyber resilience across Africa’s rapidly evolving digital economy.
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