The retail market in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) is witnessing an ever-growing demand for Artificial Intelligence (AI), as key industry players and manufacturers increasingly look at innovative products.

At the Retail Congress MENA 2019 held in Dubai, industry leaders shed lights on the latest trends, technology and innovations shaping the retail journey.

David Rowan, author, tech investor, founding editor at UK Wired and one of the speakers at the event believes China is currently leading with AI innovations and that India has got a good potential too.

“I am very interested in what is happening in Latin America and I think (in) Brazil there is an awful lot of quite smart investment,” he added, noting that he thinks Europe is being a bit slow.

The latest research report titled “Artificial Intelligence in Retail Market” published by Industry Research expects AI in the retail market to grow globally at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of over 35 percent from 2019 to 2024.

The report also notes that the growing trend of rising technology adoption in the industry can be associated with the need for streamlining retail operations, minimising efforts, and increasing revenue mostly for e-commerce retailers.

The application of artificial intelligence (AI), big data and analytics will enable businesses with a data-driven model by expanding the types of data that can be analysed and raise the level of sophistication of the resulting insight, according to the report.

UAE focus

Owen Farrow, Leader Consumer Industry at IBM Middle East told Zawya on the sidelines of the event that the UAE particularly is becoming a more common place to talk to people about AI and stands out for leading with experience.

“UAE for such a long time has been saying that the shopping experience is more than simply provision of retail, it’s the provision of entertainment, it’s the provision of all sorts of surrounding products and services,” he said.

“In UAE I think there is always been this strong focus on experience,” he added, noting that every new mall seems to offer a better experience than the one opened before it.

(Reporting by Gerard Aoun, editing by Seban Scaria)

(gerard.aoun@refinitiv.com)

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