Page 52 - March 2022 Issue 604
P. 52
Talal Al Kaissi (Chief Executive Officer – G42 Cloud):
G42 Cloud is building the MENA region’s largest and most powerful cloud
infrastructure, including sovereign cloud solutions locally and internationally
Talal Al Kaissi joined G42 in September 2020 as the Vice President of Special
Projects & Space Program in the Group CEO’s office, while effectively
assuming the role of the Group Chief of Staff. Talal’s role was to support the
Group CEO and various business verticals with special projects, as well as lead
the development of the space program within G42 inclusive of an investment
thesis, products and partnerships leveraging G42’s robust AI and cloud
computing platforms.
Talal joined G42 after 2 years at the UAE Space Agency where he served as
Senior Advisor to the Director General and UAE Embassy in Washington DC
where he worked as a Sr. Advisor for Commercial Affairs at the UAE Trade &
Commercial Office and also leading US - UAE Space Affairs.
In January 2022, Talal stepped into the role of Chief Executive Officer at G42
Cloud to bring about the next phase of the company’s evolution – maximizing
potential, while innovating and creating customer value in new and
adjacent areas.
Al Bayan Magazine met Talal during the MWC 2022 and conducted the
following interview.
* Can you give us an idea about your company? In fact, governments around the world trust cloud providers with national secu-
- Sure! Born in Abu Dhabi and operating across the world, G42 drives change rity level data to be handled by sovereign cloud solutions such the type of
by joining forces with nations, corporations and individuals, to accelerate architecture G42 Cloud provides – thus, proving the perception wrong.
progress and find answers to society’s most pressing needs. From molecular G42 Cloud has a very bust capability and the operational knowledge of setting
medicine to space travel and everything in between, together, they’re deliver- up and managing sovereign cloud solutions in the region, ensuring secure data
ing the future now. residency and complete data sovereignty for the clients. This expertise is what
G42 Cloud is a part of G42 – we are building the MENA region’s largest and we are planning to export as a bespoke model to different regions as evidenced
most powerful cloud infrastructure designed to make organizations more intu- by a recent deal we signed with the Government of Serbia and are in the
itive, agile and efficient to solve real-world challenges. Our world-class infra- process of pursuing several similar opportunities.
structure is built to serve governments, special industries and enterprises of all
sizes and leverages the power of AI to deliver superior performance. We oper- *What is the purpose behind your participation in the Mobile World
ate our cloud platform end-to-end, having built best-in-class intelligent Data Congress?
Centre facilities across the UAE. G42 Cloud also operates the Artemis High - G42 Cloud is very interested in expanding our geographic footprint and as a
Performance Computer (HPC), one of the world’s TOP500 supercomputers technology company that focuses on AI and Cloud Computing, there is no bet-
which it offers as a service to multiple clients and industries. ter forum for us to benefit from, and signal our intent, than MWC. Being one of
A good example of what we enable is the JV between G42 and ADNOC (Abu the largest global industry gathering, the conference attracts top players, latest
Dhabi National Oil Company), called AIQ. AIQ develops and commercializes AI technology offerings and captures global technology media attention. We are
products and applications for the oil and gas industry in the areas like drilling looking for a wider range of potential verticals we can bring our bespoke value
performance, reservoir modelling, corrosion detection, and product quality con- proposition to as a cloud service provider, combining efforts with other parts of
trol. G42 Cloud and our HPC are front and center in that effort to accelerate the G42. These areas of interest include industries such as finance, healthcare,
development of new AI solutions to optimize processes, improve planning and technology and many others. Hence, our presence here at the MWC today
increase profitability for ADNOC and the wider oil and gas industry. where we are meeting with many potential partners and foreign country dele-
gations where we are interested in expanding.
* Are you focusing on the UAE market only or do you have any To have been able to sign an agreement between 2 Emirati-born companies,
expansion plans? G42 Cloud and Tahaluf Al Emarat, at this event was very special. Our collabo-
- As a young Abu Dhabi born and raised company, naturally our focus has been ration aims to provide next generation applications and SaaS services to the
the UAE market in the past couple years. There has been and still is a great enterprises & government entities in the UAE and across key international
capacity for business growth locally, particularly from Abu Dhabi government markets.
and local enterprises, and similarly we have begun to expand into other
Emirates. Having said that, we have recently commenced regional and inter- * What can you tell us more about the collaboration that you have
national expansion in a few countries and are looking to grow our announced with Tahaluf Al Emarat during MWC?
geographic footprint. - We are very excited about this partnership! Through the cooperation, G42
Cloud and Tahaluf Al Emarat aim to provide secure and reliable SaaS solutions
* What are the main challenges facing you? to enterprises and government entities in the areas of process as well as con-
- I think one of the main challenges is the industry perception that cloud infra- tent & people management including “Maestro”, Tahaluf’s low-code/ no-code
structure is perceived less secure than traditional on-premises physical IT business automation platform.
setup. Because of the physical infrastructure being located inhouse, here is a The cooperation will enable both of us to leverage the full power of our plat-
natural inclination to believe that there is more control over data security. The forms, driving innovation and building intelligent, state of the art customer appli-
fact is that this cannot be further from truth. Cloud infrastructure offers more cations. This further aims to improve organizations & governments productivi-
versatility which in many aspects yields security, and is less costly and provides ty allowing them to focus on their customers and citizens not their tools.
an unmatched ability to scale beyond anything conceivable with an on premis- Partnering with Tahaluf Al Emarat allows G42 cloud to add innovative home-
es solution. Cloud clients can take advantage of not having to have the IT infra- grown UAE solutions to our offerings on our UAE cloud and serve them to var-
structure on their premises where they have to pay for the maintenance, oper- ious stakeholders. We look forward to this partnership and are confident that it
ations and have enough CapEx, and move on to a model where all their needs will enable us to build on our existing capabilities and drive digital transforma-
are being served as cloud services from the basic elastic computing, storage, tion across a wide spectrum of industries domestically and abroad.
and networking needs, all the way to creating large data lakes that can then
benefit from AI applications and unlock more insights, analytics, and support 52
value creation and monetization for a stakeholder.
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