Technology & IT | Wednesday 17 October, 2018 8:15 am |

The Sharjah Government pavilion at GITEX Technology Week 2018, the region's biggest technology event to be held until Thursday, 18 October, witnessed intense competition between Sharjah’s government entities, to unveil new services and innovative smart application to thousands of visitors.

Sheikh Khalid bin Ahmed Al Qasimi, Director General of the Department of e-Government- Sharjah (DeG), said: “We are building on the wise vision of HH Sheikh Dr. Sultan bin Muhammad Al Qasimi, Member of the UAE Federal Supreme Council, and Ruler of Sharjah, to enhance Sharjah’s status as a world-leading model city conducive for living and doing business, through the cutting edge technology solutions showcased at our pavilion at GITEX Technology Week. We began our preparations in advance to ensure a distinguished participation this year. The participants at our pavilion have pushed the boundaries to highlight their technological achievements and their role in driving Sharjah’s digital transformation. These notable digitisation initiatives deserve praise and recognition.”

Several Technology Projects

Over the last two days, several government entities participating in the Sharjah Government pavilion launched their smart projects and applications to support the emirate’s digital transformation. The Sharjah Commerce & Tourism Development Authority (SCTDA) unveiled its augmented reality application ‘Virtual Door for Sharjah City’, which allows users to open virtual doors to Sharjah and find themselves touring the city.

The Sharjah Government Media Bureau released its ‘Smart Media Platform’, the first-of-its-kind in the region. Working as a ‘Smart Controller’, the platform helps monitor and analyse media content published across various media and social networks. It also helps save time and money, while providing information on the response time in case of any emergency.

The Directorate of Housing launched its KPI evaluation system and Happiness Badge, which is connected to the KPI system for evaluating the Directorate’s strategic objectives. The system works by dividing operational objectives and assigning them to the Directorate’s departments, which are then subject to automatic evaluation.

The Sharjah Economic Development Department (SEDD) launched several projects, including the ‘Digital Transformation Platform’, ChatBot, Business continuity – ISO 22301, and the Data Science experience. 

The Directorate of Town Planning & Survey revealed its ‘Smart Survey’ service on its smart application, which streamlines the ‘Land Demarcations & Specifying Levels’ service offering delivery in 1 rather than 7 working days.

The University of Sharjah launched ‘Design the World’s Largest Mind Map in UAE’, a tool used globally for creative thinking. Khorfakkan City Municipal Council launched a new robot that serves to promote immediate and direct communication between clients who have hearing or speech difficulties and the Council's customer service staff. 

The Sharjah Finance Department launched "Hadret Saadtak," which serves the heads and directors of all government entities. It also launched "Tahseel", the digital payment package for the Smart Receiving System. The Consultative Council of Sharjah launched two services - one for Consultative Council members and another for the public.

The Consultative Council of Sharjah, in cooperation with Department of eGovernment, enables viewing and following the community's suggestions and complaints through mobile phone applications or the electronic site.

The Parliamentary Portal service has been launched in cooperation with eGovernment Department. With this, the Consultative Council members get a smart phone programme similar to the IM programme. Members can communicate with each other through an exclusive and secure database ensuring privacy. 

Through the use of Artificial Intelligence in parliamentary work, speech is converted to text saving both time and efforts by more than 80%. It aims to accelerate the communication process with the control system, giving the Consultative Council members the information required to review and take decisions as soon as possible.

Further, the enhanced Sharjah Airport Mobile Application was launched to serve travellers through Sharjah Airport by providing them with all relevant travel-related information, including flight-track notifications, accurately on their smartwatches. It also has the chatbot feature, an artificial intelligence technology, whereby bots assist users by immediately providing them with information about flights and all the services at Sharjah Airport. More than 500 devices have been distributed at the airport to send notifications via Bluetooth technology informing the passengers about marketing offers.

The Sharjah Noble Quran & Sunnah Establishment launched an ERP system to help manage Quranic sessions and the attendance of students. Kalba Municipality unveiled the Kalba City Municipality Application that offers information about the various activities in the city and the most important attractions, in addition to a Municipal Services Guide that showcases the services offered to customers. 

In the coming days, the Sharjah Government Pavilion will witness the launch of several new services and applications by various government departments and entities.