From: Times of Oman

Muscat: In an effort to support small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and strengthen the cooperation between the government entities, a delegation from the Ministry of Defence headed by Mohammed bin Nasser Al Rasbi, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Defense, visited the Information Technology Authority (ITA), on Thursday, 13 June 2013, where they were greeted by Dr. Salim Sultan Al Ruzaiqi, CEO of ITA, and some ITA officials, at ITA’s premises located on the 4th Floor in the KOM4 building, at the Knowledge Oasis Muscat.

The aim of the visit was to inform about the ITA’s role in support of SMEs in the Sultanate. The visit focused on the ITA’s latest initiative, Sas Programme for Entrepreneurship and the services it provides to small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the Sultanate, in addition to introducing some ITA’s  initiatives such as the Oman Computer Emergency Readiness Team (OCERT) and Center of Excellence for eContent and Applications Development.

The visit started with a presentation about the Sas Programme, presented by Maha Mohammed Albulushi, Senior Project Specialist at ITA, in which she talked about the launch of the Sas Center, the services it provides to the incubated companies, and the criteria and processes to join the center. After that, Hassan Fida Al Lawati, Senior Project Specialist at ITA, introduced the Authority’s upcoming initiative in support of SMEs in the Sultanate. The ICT SMEs Registration and Development Program builds a database of all the SMEs existing in the ICT field, to help the government and private entities reach them easily. During the presentation, different issues were raised in regard of the percentage of the Omanization in SMEs, SMEs presence in the market, and the cooperation between SMEs and the big players in the market.

The delegation toured the Sas Center and met with the entrepreneurs, who showed their companies’ services and achievements. The Sas Center targets small and medium ICT businesses, students, and jobseekers of any age interested in starting a business. It seeks to develop an internationally competitive ICT industry in Oman, attract more foreign and local investment in the ICT sector, encourage and support innovation by contributing to the introduction of new technologies to create innovative products, solutions and services and encourage young graduates to create their own businesses through the  development and implementation of  entrepreneurship culture-building activities.

As part of the visit, the guests visited the Center of Excellence for eContent and Applications Development which is a new project aimed to assist with the business development of SMEs. This Center operates with the support and collaboration of eon reality and ASM Technology. The first batch trained in the center graduated in April 2013, and the second batch has already started the training, which will last for three months.

As one of the key e.oman strategy projects, the eContent and Application Development project aims to encourage the development of an eContent industry in the Sultanate and enrich the local electronic content, through providing the suitable environment and infrastructure to meet the various requirements to support the development of eContent in its various uses.

With conclusion of the tour of the Sas Center and the Center of Excellence for eContent and Applications Development in KOM4, the delegation visited Oman National CERT, in which they were briefed about the center’s role in protecting the cyber space and helping the government entities to secure their data. Eng. Badar Al Salehi, Director of OCERT, took the guests on a tour to the center and talked about OCERT designation by the ITU to be the Regional Cyber Security Center for the Arab Region. Al Salehi briefed the guests about the several security aspects that are covered by the Center and provided to the Arab countries including: cyber security capacity building, child online protection, information sharing, CERT establishment, workshops & conferences, cyber drills, incident response, and ITU partners’ services.