The SAMENA Telecommunications Council has called for stronger exchange of knowledge, experience, and technological capability between leading and emerging digital markets, with telecom operators and technology providers helping turn such exchange into local industry development, investment, and new market opportunities.
Delivering a keynote address in Hangzhou, SAMENA Council CEO Bocar BA reflected on two decades of digital transformation across economies. Connectivity has expanded, industries have changed, new businesses have emerged, and governments have adopted digital platforms and new ICT strategies throughout the SA-ME-NA region and surrounding geographies. This progress has also produced an extensive body of knowledge held in data, institutions, companies, and the experience of their people. AI can help put more of that knowledge to use.
“AI can help preserve institutional memory, connect information that has remained fragmented, and bring accumulated experience more effectively into present-day decision-making. This can be described as Institutional Intelligence,” BA stated.
For the SAMENA Council, a wider matter of interest is how knowledge and capability can move more effectively between markets. Telecom operators, technology providers, regulatory authorities, public institutions, research bodies, investors, and other participants in the digital economy each hold experience that can inform infrastructure development, technology deployment, institutional planning, and the creation of new services and businesses elsewhere.
Speaking at the Ministerial Meeting at Hangzhou, organized by the China-Africa Digital Technology Co-operation Center, BA noted that cross-border cooperation has already supported digital infrastructure and technological capability across Africa and the Middle East. Further engagement can connect China’s experience in digital development, industrial transformation, and innovation at scale with the ambitions, market knowledge, and development needs of emerging digital economies.
“The value lies in connecting these capabilities across markets, with telecom operators at the center of this exchange. Digital transformation needs to enable our markets and institutions to do better,” BA added.
The SAMENA Council sees scope for new institutional initiatives that bring companies, institutions, expertise, investment, and potential projects into a continuing framework of cooperation. This would allow engagement to move beyond individual meetings and technology deployments toward practical industry relationships, locally developed capability, and new opportunities across participating markets, especially the UAE and other GCC economies. Such cooperation is especially relevant as Africa and the Middle East continue to expand their digital infrastructure and industries. Their engagement with more established digital markets, such as China, Malaysia, among others, should support access to experience and technology while allowing local priorities, market conditions, and capabilities to shape what is developed.
Source: SAMENA Council Press Release
