Saturday, Dec 27, 2008
Gulf News
Dubai: Business activity in Dubai has continued - minus a few evident setbacks here and there.
Many powerful companies are going ahead with plans to set up headquarters in one of today's most talked about cities.
TransMedia Corporation, a US-based multi-media and technology company providing "compatible and integrated multipurpose software" to develop and enhance Digital Human Interaction (DHI), is one example.
The company's chairman and chief executive officer Donald Leka spoke to Gulf News about the importance of having a presence in Dubai.
"The Middle East has attracted the world's largest technology companies symbolised by Dubai's vibrant Internet City, Media City and Knowledge Village," Leka said.
"The next step is to create a thriving entrepre-neurial technology community that will generate the new ideas of tomorrow. We hope the entrepre-neurial spirit of TransMedia will make its own unique contribution to the technology industry in the Middle East."
The company is just a few years old yet is already listed as one of the 100 most influential technology and media companies in the world, in the 2008 to 2009 EContent Magazine.
The list includes other big names such as Apple, Facebook, Google and Micro-soft. Another big achievement for the company is Glide, the new platform for a complete mobile desktop environment featuring an automatic compatibility engine.
"Glide has been widely recognised in the industry as having successfully demonstrated the possibility of a true horizontal cross computing platform that ushers in a new era of compatibility and integration," said Leka.
The company views Glide as technology without borders because it runs on Windows, Mac, Linux, Solaris, Android, BlackBerry, iPhone, Palm, Symbian and Windows Mobile, providing users with compatibility with virtually everyone they communicate with.
The model took five years to build, allowing for powerful enterprise and business versions to be developed in addition to the consumer version already available in the market. They are scheduled to be launched in the first quarter of 2009.
So, the question now is how safe is one's personal information? Leka assures Glide offers integrated tools to protect user privacy in order to allow "safe social and business networking".
And because the business model does not rely on advertising to generate revenue, user's email accounts and other personal information is not made available to other vendors.
Control interaction
"Users can control how they interact with others," said Leka. "They can control access to their personal profiles, files and information and set the access rights of recipients of emails and participants in groups and live conferences with Glide's powerful rights management tools."
With TransMedia setting up in Dubai, Leka believes privacy awareness in the Middle East will increase - only by using sophisticated tools to increase compatibility and integration between users of different technology platforms while protecting user's files and information.
"We see Dubai in many ways as the "New" New York - a city of great ethnic diversity, youth, energy and talent. That is why we have decided to establish a principal office for TransMedia in Dubai."
Glide has users in more than 100 countries and is available in 18 languages, making it possible for TransMedia to launch the Glide OS World Development Program - a mobile technology platform to advance social and economic development in the developing world.
Some of the challenges the company faced include having to resist pressure in forming relationships with other portfolio companies or industry giants that Leka says foster propriety technology and business models.
Gulf News 2008. All rights reserved.
