UAE Leads Middle East in Competitiveness

The United Arab Emirates has consolidated its leadership in the Middle East region in terms of competitiveness, according to a new report by the World Economic Forum (WEF).

The WEF has stated the UAE is the Middle East’s “main tech and innovation hub”.

In 2017, its entrepreneurship and start-up ecosystem attracted global attention with the acquisition of Souq.com, a local e-commerce platform, by Amazon, for an estimated value of US$650-700 million.

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This is set not to remain an isolated case as the country dramatically ramped up equity investments in technology firms from $100 million in 2014 to $1.7 billion in 2016.

While other MENA countries are also taking action to spur entrepreneurship, increase diversification and improve the competitiveness of their economies, the WEF outlined how the UAE’s approach was the “sustainable way to continue their transition away from reliance on natural resources and a distortive use of public money”.

You can read the full report here

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