The 7th edition of the longest running digital conference in the Middle East promises yet again another exclusive event, with new initiatives and upgraded experiences that follow a rise in Beirut’s digital industry.
With an increased interest from regional and international players in the digital capabilities of the Levant’s and Lebanon’s markets, ArabNet Beirut will witness various high-level announcements linked to this positive trend. “ ArabNet Beirut will have a major regional French initiative that is set to be launched in Beirut, and will be announced during the conference”, says Omar Habib, Marketing Director at ArabNet.
The 3-day conference will feature high-caliber, international and regional speakers, who are themselves initiators of change, and ready to introduce the latest into MENA. Speakers include entrepreneurship expert Marvin Liao, Partner at 500Startups; Maya Farah, Director of Product at Zynga (one of the biggest game creators online); Redg Snodgrass, CEO of ReadWrite and Wearable IoT World (one of the biggest Hardware Innovation players out there); Sumeet Jain, General Partner at Luma Capital Partners (early stage venture firm exclusive to the next generation of innovation in marketing technology); and Space Systems Engineer from Axelspace Corporation in Japan, Lucas Bremond.
The conference kicks off with the Design+Code day, a pre-conference set of workshops designed to train developers, designers and entrepreneurs on building great web & mobile products. ArabNet Beirut 2016 then carries on with the two-day Forum, focused on the latest in digital media, e-business, technology and entrepreneurship. Covered topics range from new ventures in social media, to hardware innovation, educational technology, and the latest in entrepreneurship development such as the Maker Movement.
Emphasis will be placed on the Maker Movement, and a Makerspace Area will be set in the ArabNet TechFair, the accompanying exhibition to the conference. The Makerspace area will include winning teams from She Develops (the first women only hackathon in Lebanon), as well as a team of Lebanese Robotics competitors, who get funding from the Ministry of Education, and Innovation Avenue participants, the latter being a newly launched ArabNet competition/initiative, designed for young hardware developers and designers in the MENA region to showcase their products.
An invitation-only Banking Innovation sidetrack will group C-level executives from the top Lebanese banks. This first-time initiative will discuss globally-innovative digital finance companies and introduce new research on Arab consumer attitudes and behaviors regarding online/mobile banking.
Young entrepreneurs will receive much focus through initiatives such as The Matchup, helping startups connect with potential clients, strategic partners and investors from across the region. The conference also features ArabNet's signature competitions, Ideathon, Startup Demo and Creative Combat, the latter aimed at highlighting young regional talents in the advertising, communications and media industries.
ArabNet Beirut 2016 will be held at the prestigious Habtoor Hilton Hotel in Beirut, on March 1, 2 and 3. Past ArabNet events have notably attracted high-caliber speakers, tech-savvy participants, and corporate partners from across the region and the world, such as Google, Touch, Facebook, DMS, Alfa, Microsoft, Banque Audi, STC, Twitter, Starcom, Mashable, Criteo, LBCI, SkyNews, VISA, Deloitte, Uber, Vivaki, GE, MakerStudios (Disney), 500Startups, CNBC, International New York Times, and many more.
For further information about ArabNet Beirut 2016: www.arabnet.me/conference/beirut
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