Manish Mishra, Head – Middle East & Africa at Freshworks, said while delivering the event keynote speech, “the last two years have accelerated the pace of change globally, creating higher expectations from employees and customers. At the same time, the Work-from-Anywhere workforce model and the Engage-from-Anywhere customer experience model have put pressure on organizations to deliver faster time-to-value for technology-enabled initiatives. Our event arms regional businesses with unparalleled insight into the key CX trends they now need to navigate. Together with Freshworks, they can break down silos to empower employees to more easily create delightful experiences for the people most important to their business.”

The event included a customer panel, headlined by Silvia Gomez, Director of Customer Experience at BitOasis, Shubham Grover, Product Manager at Swvl, Divek Karagwal, Head of Omnichannel Experiences at the Landmark Group, and Zachariah Manyapye of Fine Hygienic Holding.

Ecommerce continues to be one of the most fast-paced and competitive global industries, with industry-watchers estimating that online sales will constitute a fifth of all retail sales worldwide by the end of 2022. As vendors strive to capture their share of market growth, they need to offer exceptional customer experiences that build loyalty and repeat revenue. However, delivering omnichannel excellence puts considerable pressure on infrastructure as site traffic increases and consumer expectations rise.

At the same time, the sector is heavily targeted by cybercriminals seeking to disrupt, extort and damage online retail businesses. Consequently, striking a balance between operational efficiency, cost control, security, and customer satisfaction is a complex challenge.

To resolve the tension between availability, performance, efficiency, and security, most e-commerce providers are accelerating their cloud transition programs with many opting for a multi-cloud strategy. These decisions are driven by the changing landscape in which they are operating and the nature and intensity of the cyber threats they face.

Security concerns: Brand and reputation are crown jewels for e-commerce companies

Ecommerce providers are acutely aware that trust is intrinsic to building customer loyalty. Anything that damages reputations and threatens customer confidence has a long-term impact on revenues. It’s not surprising, therefore, that cyber defacement and brand damage are top concerns for 62% and 49% of the businesses surveyed respectively. Linked to this is concern over user data theft and credit card theft, identified as a top concern by 52% and 36% of respondents.

Away from direct public-facing threats, more than one-third of companies cited DDoS attacks as a key concern. This is not surprising, given the increase in DDoS attacks and the potential loss of revenue. The report indicated that some e-commerce providers are struggling to resolve this issue, with one in ten reporting that they had lost availability due to a DDoS attack. Given that this directly affects revenue generation, and creates a poor customer experience, organizations should focus on ensuring that their DDoS mitigation strategy and tools are effective.

Performance pitfalls: high traffic and security trade-offs are impacting uptime

On the performance side of the equation, 86% of the e-commerce businesses we surveyed reported a significant increase in traffic. This is undoubtedly a result of the pivot to online purchasing made by millions during the pandemic, but in an industry well-used to handling seasonal spikes it was surprising that businesses reported downtime caused by traffic spikes as a top issue in the past year. This is potentially related to the heavier performance demands from new technology standards, such as the encryption required by Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS).

Priorities have changed in a multi-cloud environment

Managing performance and mitigating security threats have a different complexion in a multi-cloud environment compared to traditional on-premises systems. Our research found that the complexity of multi-cloud IT has reshaped the priorities of IT leaders.

While traditional e-commerce priorities such as disaster recovery and the ability to scale to meet seasonal demand remain important, they have dropped down the list as the resource-intensive nature of multi-cloud management becomes apparent.

Consequently, e-commerce IT leaders are seeking solutions that provide control and visibility. 60% cited centralized management and analytics as a key requirement for successful multi-cloud adoption. Consistent application delivery and security came a close second, while 46% sought efficient automation.

Adopting a polynimbus approach

As e-commerce companies continue their journey to the cloud, there’s no doubt that focus is needed to resolve the identified challenges and ensure that they gain all the benefits of multi-cloud flexibility, without losing control and visibility over critical elements of the environment.

Here, a polynimbus approach to application delivery helps simplify management and automate operations in multi-cloud deployments. It also centralizes security policy enforcement, helping organizations answer governance and compliance demands.

Seamless Middle East returns again this year with its 22^nd edition on the 31^st of May and 1^st of June. This means that the city will be rife with the brightest minds in the fintech, payments, identity, e-commerce, and retail industries. At Seamless Middle East, all topics within these industries will be discussed at the conference from keynote panels such as ‘Discovering augmented ID: an enhanced, adaptable, and self-sovereign identity that creates a safer digital self’ and ‘Stimulating digital commerce growth: staying ahead of the industry’s tech trends’ to having various technological solutions demonstrated on the exhibition floor.

Held under the patronage of His Highness Lt. General Sheikh Saif bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Interior. Seamless Middle East will gather like-minded individuals and global industry heads to enable and strive for a more advanced technological age within these industries for UAE.

Spanning two days of exciting experiences and content, Seamless Middle East will cover topics ranging from omnichannel optimization, intelligent e-commerce, digital transformation, warehouse automation, instore tech, and so much more. With their exhibition floor hosting innovative solutions and advancements.

Seamless Middle East’s conference, which will be held will be hosting 300+ speakers. This will include globally recognized people in their industries such as Dr. Bijna Kotak Dasani, the Executive Director of Morgan Stanley, and Ksenia Ternyuk, Global Head of Retail Development of Alexander McQueen. Both of whom will be speaking live, on stage at Dubai World Trade Centre.

Joining as Seamless Middle East’s title sponsor is Dubai CommerCity, the first and leading e-commerce free-zone in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia (MEASA) region. Facilitating the growth of regional and international businesses to capture exponential e-commerce growth opportunities with these regions. Keynote Speaker at Seamless Middle East, DeVere Forster, Chief Operating Officer at Dubai CommerCity commented: “we continue to witness a surging demand for the e-commerce market, with the continued increase in the number of internet shoppers across the different sectors. At Dubai CommerCity, we strive to keep up with this increase in demand by providing any customer looking to setup or expand their e-commerce business with all-inclusive services, solutions, and packages to grow and scale their business.”

“We look forward to our participation in Seamless Middle East and being a Title Sponsor for the event, which is going to bring industry experts together to outline the future of the e-commerce industry. Between 2019 and 2022, the UAE was one of the fastest growing e-commerce markets in the MEASA region with a compounded growth rate equivalent to 38.3%. In the upcoming edition of Seamless Middle East, Dubai CommerCity will be showcasing its strategy to maintain and boost the market growth in the e-commerce sector.” Forster added.

Combined with the conference is a free-to-attend exhibition, Seamless Middle East offers attendees the chance to explore their exhibition floor, that’ll host the latest advancements in technological solutions and innovative ideas live and in-person. From the 350+ showcasing exhibitors, the likes of automyze, Cardel, eFunder, lemnisk, LikeCard, Telr, Verimsoft, and so many more will be a part of the exhibition floor.

They offer other free-to-attend features such as the E-commerce University, the Start-up Showcase, and the return of face-to-face networking.

Seamless Middle East will be held at Dubai World Trade Centre, Dubai, UAE on 31 May – 1 June 2022. Visit the link for more information and to register: https://bit.ly/36CzyIE

Event Details:

• What: Seamless Middle East
• Where: Dubai World Trade Centre
• When: Tuesday 31 May – Wednesday 1 June

Social Media:

• Twitter @SeamlessMENA
• LinkedIn: Seamless Middle East & North Africa
• Facebook: @seamless middle east

#SeamlessDXB

Written by: Adrian Taylor, A10 Networks

Ecommerce continues to be one of the most fast-paced and competitive global industries, with industry-watchers estimating that online sales will constitute a fifth of all retail sales worldwide by the end of 2022. As vendors strive to capture their share of market growth, they need to offer exceptional customer experiences that build loyalty and repeat revenue. However, delivering omnichannel excellence puts considerable pressure on infrastructure as site traffic increases and consumer expectations rise.

At the same time, the sector is heavily targeted by cybercriminals seeking to disrupt, extort and damage online retail businesses. Consequently, striking a balance between operational efficiency, cost control, security, and customer satisfaction is a complex challenge.

Adrian Taylor, VP of EMEA at A10 Networks

To resolve the tension between availability, performance, efficiency, and security, most e-commerce providers are accelerating their cloud transition programs with many opting for a multi-cloud strategy. These decisions are driven by the changing landscape in which they are operating and the nature and intensity of the cyber threats they face.

Security concerns: Brand and reputation are crown jewels for e-commerce companies

Ecommerce providers are acutely aware that trust is intrinsic to building customer loyalty. Anything that damages reputations and threatens customer confidence has a long-term impact on revenues. It’s not surprising, therefore, that cyber defacement and brand damage are top concerns for 62% and 49% of the businesses surveyed respectively. Linked to this is concern over user data theft and credit card theft, identified as a top concern by 52% and 36% of respondents.

Away from direct public-facing threats, more than one-third of companies cited DDoS attacks as a key concern. This is not surprising, given the increase in DDoS attacks and the potential loss of revenue. The report indicated that some e-commerce providers are struggling to resolve this issue, with one in ten reporting that they had lost availability due to a DDoS attack. Given that this directly affects revenue generation, and creates a poor customer experience, organizations should focus on ensuring that their DDoS mitigation strategy and tools are effective.

Performance pitfalls: high traffic and security trade-offs are impacting uptime

On the performance side of the equation, 86% of the e-commerce businesses we surveyed reported a significant increase in traffic. This is undoubtedly a result of the pivot to online purchasing made by millions during the pandemic, but in an industry well-used to handling seasonal spikes it was surprising that businesses reported downtime caused by traffic spikes as a top issue in the past year. This is potentially related to the heavier performance demands from new technology standards, such as the encryption required by Perfect Forward Secrecy (PFS).

Priorities have changed in a multi-cloud environment

Managing performance and mitigating security threats have a different complexion in a multi-cloud environment compared to traditional on-premises systems. Our research found that the complexity of multi-cloud IT has reshaped the priorities of IT leaders.

While traditional e-commerce priorities such as disaster recovery and the ability to scale to meet seasonal demand remain important, they have dropped down the list as the resource-intensive nature of multi-cloud management becomes apparent.

Consequently, e-commerce IT leaders are seeking solutions that provide control and visibility. 60% cited centralized management and analytics as a key requirement for successful multi-cloud adoption. Consistent application delivery and security came a close second, while 46% sought efficient automation.

Adopting a polynimbus approach

As e-commerce companies continue their journey to the cloud, there’s no doubt that focus is needed to resolve the identified challenges and ensure that they gain all the benefits of multi-cloud flexibility, without losing control and visibility over critical elements of the environment.

Here, a polynimbus approach to application delivery helps simplify management and automate operations in multi-cloud deployments. It also centralizes security policy enforcement, helping organizations answer governance and compliance demands.