Intel Scholarships and Internships

Thirteen students from across the Middle East and Turkey have been awarded a three- to six-month internship at one of Intel’s sites around the world, as part of the “Intel Engineering Excellence Program.” In Jordan and Turkey, five students respectively, were also awarded an opportunity for a scholarship program for their remaining period of studies. The program was launched in November 2005 and has been rolled out in Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia and Turkey.

“The ‘Intel Engineering Excellence Program’ offers numerous social and economic benefits to students in each of the participating countries and in the region,” said Abdulrahman Jarrar, Intel’s regional government affairs manager, Middle East, Turkey, Africa. “The program focuses on developing critical information and communication technology skills and facilitating knowledge transfer within individual countries and across borders, which are key needs of governments throughout the region. It is representative of Intel’s commitment to help drive economic development and job creation; this enables Middle East citizens to become more competitive in the global marketplace and thus accelerate the overall growth of the region.”

HP Appoints SPO Manager for ME

Hewlett-Packard Middle East is pleased to announce the appointment of Salim Ziade as Solution Partners Organization (SPO) Manager for the Middle East with immediate effect. Ziade has been with Hewlett-Packard since 1997 and has worked in the EMEA region before taking the PSG Category Manager assignment for the Middle East 18 months ago. Ziade has played an important role in the transformation the PSG Middle East business into a high growth, market share winning engine.

Ziade will work closely with all three Business Groups (Imaging and Printing, Technical Solutions and Personal Solutions) and HP’s Networking Group, HP Procurve, to help grow HP’s business through Channel Partners. Ziade will report to Anil Gandhi, GM, PSG, HP Middle East.

KFUPM Implements Savvion

King Fahd University of Petroleum & Minerals (KFUPM) has implemented Savvion for its university-wide business process management initiative. Process improvements are now in place across the university, including human resources, finance, scientific research, materials management, admissions, student affairs, registration and administration departments.

KFUPM has an enrollment of approximately 8,000 full-time undergraduate and 700 full-time graduate students. When part-time and continuing education students are added, the total number of students exceeds 9,500. The goal of any educational institution is to offer the highest level of teaching and service to its students in the most efficient and cost effective manner. KFUPM saw a return on investment (ROI) almost immediately with Savvion when an enterprise resource planning (ERP) project that was scheduled to take three months to complete was finished in less than 30 days, thanks to process improvements enabled by Savvion.

Obtaining research grants are an important part of maintaining a university’s leadership position. Using the Savvion Process Modeler, KFUPM researchers and faculty members are able to model the process they go through when submitting requests for grants for research projects. Each request is modeled and then placed in a repository so future faculty members and researchers can refer back to best practices when submitting for project grants. This has made it much easier for researchers to navigate the often complex process of submitting for and receiving research grants.

Rawabi Telecom Selects Pactolus

Rawabi Telecom and Software (RTS), a subsidiary of Rawabi Holding Company, has selected Pactolus Communications Software Corporation’s SIPware Services and RapidFLEX Service Creation Environment. RTS will offer a range of IP services including Voice over Broadband Telephony, IP Conferencing and Prepaid Calling to customers throughout the UAE, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Qatar and Kuwait via its growing network of service provider partners.

“RTS is committed to supporting the growth of Saudi Arabia, the GCC countries and the greater MENA region,” noted Rawabi Telecom & Software Chief Operating Officer Maro Simatovic. “We’re driven to provide differentiating services that uniquely serve this fast-growing region, and we will fully leverage Rawabi Holding Company’s brand power and efficient customer acquisition and communications channels.”

RTS is developing an advanced services infrastructure to support the economic delivery of integrated landline, Internet, television and mobile services bundles, and provide consumers with new value, simplicity and choice. RTS is honing these service offerings through a detailed analysis of subscriber service preferences, and is working with partners to realize next-gen services opportunities as the region’s telecom industry undergoes deregulation.

Verscom is lead integrator for RTS. Verscom is deploying Pactolus’ SIPware IP voice services suite and using the RapidFLEX Service Creation Environment to build broadband voice, prepaid and conferencing services.

11th Annual GSM 3G ME and Gulf Event

More than 1,500 attendees are expected at the 2006 GSM 3G Middle East and Gulf (MEG) conference and exhibition on Sept. 11-12 at the Dubai International Convention Centre. As part of Informa Telecom and Media’s GSM 3G World Series, the GSM 3G Middle East and Gulf (MEG) conference and exhibition is being held amid a widespread move to adopt 3G technology in the MEG region. The number of mobile subscribers in the region is booming. From 2002 to 2005, the number of subscribers grew by 15 million, bringing the region’s total number of subscribers to 47 million.

“Saudi Arabia now has competing operators for the first time ever,” said Informa Telecoms and Media’s Wireless Strategy Researcher Jordan Stone. “Iraq’s subscribers nearly doubled in number last year. With an industry expanding at this rate, everyone needs to keep abreast of the latest developments.”

Stone added that third generation technology — known as 3G — has become more prevalent throughout the region. 3G allows for better quality voice and enables a new generation of mobile value added services (VAS) to be deployed to users in the Middle East and the Gulf. Stone believes it will be a hot topic at this year’s conference.