Gov & Regulators

Muscat, March 24th 2013 – Demonstrating environmental stewardship through innovative and environmentally conscious design, Omran won the ‘Sustainability Initiative of the Year Award’ at the second Construction Week Awards Oman held in Muscat last week. Honoring leading construction achievements and projects throughout Oman, the Award was granted to Omran for its soon to be inaugurated four star property, Crowne Plaza Duqm.

Engineer Wael Al Lawati, CEO of Omran said that the Award showcases Omran’s ongoing efforts to create memorable tourism destinations that are in harmony with Oman’s environment. He said that Crowne Plaza Duqm was able to achieve this prestigious win through implementing a simple yet extremely effective design concept to its Sewage Treatment Plant (STP). This resulted in reducing water consumption and safeguarding the wellbeing of the local community that relies on fishing as one of its main sources of income.

OMAN ROAD SAFETY ASSOCIATION PARTICIPATES IN ADVOCACY & AWARENESS MEET IN SAMAIL ORGANISED BY ROYAL OMAN POLICE

Samail, 11 March 2013 - Oman Road Safety Association (ORSA), the first and only registered non-governmental road safety organisation, has recently participated in the Advocacy & Awareness Meet organised by Royal Oman Police (ROP) in Wilayat Samail of A'Dakhiliyah Governorate to introduce and empower the local community on road and traffic safety. The event was attended by a number of Walis and dignitaries of the region and representatives from Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) as well as government and private institutions.

Shaima Murtadha Al Lawati, ORSA Chief Executive Officer delivered an awareness lecture on road and traffic safety, stating the objectives of the association and its activities. She also highlighted the important role of local communities in activating partnerships between the Association and general public and in raising awareness on road safety culture and behaviour.

Muscat, March 3rd 2013 – The Muscat Youth Summit (MYS) 2012 mobile exhibition opened its doors to the public at Muscat Grand Mall on Sunday morning showing the culmination of what was a life-changing experience for 200 young people from 26 countries.

From 3 – 7 March, visitors to the exhibit will be able to walk through the Summit’s highlights and witness the creativity and entrepreneurship of the next generation of decision makers and social innovators.

In a ceremony held under the auspices of His Highness Sayyid Faisal bin Turki Al Said, Chairperson of the Muscat Youth Summit Organizing Committee, key partners and supporters came together with heads of schools and colleges from across Oman to celebrate the achievements of the bright students aged between 15 and 24 who attended the Summit last December. The MYS 2012 video was also aired to the audience for the first time shedding light on the various workshops and discussions that took place throughout the four day residential program.  

Speaking about the benefits of engaging the youth of Oman, His Highness Sayyid Faisal said: “The theme of the 2012 Summit was ‘Investing in Tomorrow’ and focused on entrepreneurship, innovation, urban development and road traffic safety. Through a series of diverse and interactive workshops, we were able to offer young people an invaluable insight into the skill sets required to succeed in today’s labour market. The mobile exhibition is manned by MYS alumni, and has been designed specifically to share the sights and sounds of the Summit with the wider community. Hopefully, it’ll also spark an interest in enterprise and innovation.”

Muscat, 26 February 2013:

Public Authority for Civil Defence and Ambulance, Royal Oman Police together with IQPC and GEC are organising the first annual Fire Safety Technology Forum Oman on 4 and 5 March 2013 at Al Bustan Palace in Muscat, Oman.

Maj. Gen. Abdullah bin Ali Hamad Al-Harthy, Chairman for Public Authority for Civil Defense and Ambulance is opening the summit.

Fire Safety Technology Forum Oman is an international conference and exhibition dedicated to showcasing the latest advancements in technologies, techniques and products that will help prevent major fire disasters and overcome everyday safety challenges. This event will bring together over 80 Fire Chiefs, Officers and Engineers from a range of cross-industry sectors including: oil and gas, utilities, airports, seaports, construction, defence infrastructure and tourism; to learn and implement the latest techniques and strategies from technical presentations and case studies.

February 26, 2013

The Sultanate of Oman’s Ministry of Tourism will conduct a presentation about Oman’s increasing focus on business tourism during its participation at the MICE Arabia Congress, taking place in Doha, Qatar from February 27 to 28, 2013. Khalid Al Zadjali, Director of Tourism Events at the Oman Ministry of Tourism, will attend as an invited speaker to share key industry insights about Oman’s latest business tourism offerings during the invitation only, high-level congress. In particular focus is the Oman Conference and Exhibition Centre, scheduled for completion in 2016. The event brings together a select group of corporates and travel agents to discover new venues and source facilitators to host future MICE-related (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions) activities.

Khalid Al Zadjali said: “The Government of Oman has channelled massive investments to develop a truly world-class infrastructure that will position Oman as one of the leading MICE tourism destinations in the world. The Ministry’s vision is to provide a genuinely unique range of business tourism amenities with a distinctive local flavour, taking advantage of Oman’s rich cultural heritage and exquisite natural attractions. MICE Arabia Congress is a powerful gathering of leading decision makers in the regional and global business tourism industry, providing an excellent platform to showcase the gains that Oman has achieved towards building its core business tourism infrastructure. Moreover, this is also a great opportunity to further strengthen our net   work of strategic partners, particularly in Qatar which has been a key growth market for Oman’s tourism industry.”

Recommendations made for the comprehensive and integrated strategy for the dissemination and use of free software and open source software

19 February 2013

The first Free & Open Source Software Conference (FOSSC-Oman’ 2013), jointly organized by the Communication & Information Research Centre (CIRC) at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU) and the Information Technology Authority (ITA), came to a close today. The two-day conference, the first of its kind ever organized in the Sultanate, opened yesterday under the patronage of H.E. Dr. Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Futaisi, Minister of Transport & Communications. Dr. Salim Sultan Al Ruzaiqi, ITA’s Chief Executive Officer, and H.E. Dr. Ali bin Saud Bemani, Vice Chancellor & Chairman of SQU, were also in attendance during the conference, along with a number of ICT professionals, academics, students and some of the larger FOSS community from Oman and abroad.

The activities of the second day of FOSSC-Oman’2013 echoed those of the first day, where a number of ICT experts and specialists in free and open source software gave informative presentations. Key themes addresses during Day 2 of the conference included the topics of Open Source & Government, and Cloud & Open Source.

Speaking to one of the attendees at the conference, Munthar Al Hamdani, a student at the Faculty of Engineering at SQU and Head of the FOSS student group supervised by CIRC, said: “The FOSS group at SQU, with their relentless passion for free and open source software, helped to pave the way for the conference to happen. The FOSS group seeks to raise awareness in this area and, FOSSC-Oman’2013, being held for the first time in the Sultanate will facilitate the process of spreading awareness in this area, through the direction to host the conference every two years with the support of the Information Technology Authority.”

18 February 2013

The activities of the Free & Open Source Software Conference (FOSSC-Oman’ 2013), jointly organized by the Communication & Information Research Centre (CIRC) at Sultan Qaboos University (SQU), and Information Technology Authority (ITA), kicked off at SQU Conference Hall today, under the patronage of H.E. Dr. Ahmed bin Mohammed  Al Futaisi, Minister of Transport & Communications. A number of Information & Communications Technology (ICT) professional, academics, students and broader FOSS community from Oman and abroad are attending the two day conference in order to share their experiences and discuss potential implementations of FOSS.

Speaking on the occasion, H.E. Dr. Ahmed bin Mohammed Al Futaisi underscored the need to promote awareness on open source software in the current era pointing out that most of the modern communication devices including smart phones are using open source software. Popular social networking platforms such as Facebook and Twitter are also based on FOSS. He lauded the efforts of ITA and SQU in promoting awareness on the use and development of FOSS in the Sultanate.

Prof. Amer bin Ali Al Rawas, SQU Deputy Vice Chancellor for Postgraduate Studies & Research, in his address at the opening ceremony, said that Oman can do a lot with regard to the use of FOSS in the country and the region through capacity building initiatives and creating new opportunities. “SQU is keen to spread the culture of FOSS in the region and is supporting the national free and open source software initiative launched in the Sultanate between CIRC & ITA. SQU has signed an agreement with ITA to promote the use of FOSS in the country and a lot of joint activities and training have been implemented since the signing of an MoU in Spring 2010. This conference is a culmination of the cooperation between ITA and CIRC at SQU. The need of the hour is to spread more awareness among students and computer users at large to use open source software in the Sultanate. SQU is keen to associate with more local, regional and international organizations in this regard”, added Prof. Al Rawas.

24x7 hotline service backed by Interactive Intelligence’s proprietary CIC all-in-one contact centre software solution

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates, 18th February, 2013: Interactive Intelligence Group Inc. (Nasdaq: ININ), today announced the successful implementation of an end-to-end contact centre solution for the management of Muscat Municipality's 1111 customer support hotline, based on its market leading Customer Interaction Center™ (CIC). The solution was proposed by Interactive Intelligence's partner, ITON, who implemented it as a part of its award winning ITON eService platform.

Khalid Dawood al Zadjali, assistant director general of information systems at Muscat Municipality said, “The contact centre was formed to ensure better services for the public by all sectors concerned with municipal work. The aim of the project was to provide our customers with a means to avail support from varied channels such as the 1111 service line, web portal, email, fax and smartphone apps. For all this to be possible it was absolutely vital to have an integrated end-to-end solution that could handle all the back-end functionalities.”

Commenting on the selection process, Shaheen Haque, Territory Manager, Middle East & Turkey at Interactive Intelligence said, “Among an exhaustive list of requirements put forth by the customer were bi-lingual support, high scalability, access through multiple channels and seamless integration with existing systems. All of these are inherent in the CIC platform, which is why our solution, bundled with the eServices platform from ITON, was selected from among 16 other proposed solutions.”