GISEC Dubai - Live events are back!
By Oren T. Dvoskin / Global Marketing Director @ Sasa Software
Face to face meetings are back!
We just returned from GISEC 2021– the Gulf’s leading Cybersecurity event. It was our first F2F event and our first business travel outside of Israel since #COVID. It truly dawned on me when meeting a partner before the event. I handed over my business card and realized that was the first time I’ve done that ritual in over a year.
Zoom has been great (Teams much less) and improves one’s communications skills, but in-person quality time with your partners, customers, and… competitors… is irreplaceable.
COVID test and protocols add an overhead and costs to business travels – I did 5 (five!) PCR tests in a week.
A year+ of living with COVID made the “sanitized” and mask-wearing environment at GISEC quite familiar, especially with the event adhering to strict healthcare measures. Private meetings, especially where everyone was vaccinated was mostly without masks. We went through four (well, I actually had five!) PCR tests in one week, but it’s a little nuisance compared to the benefits of being on the ground. COVID procedures don’t add significant overhead to air travel, as long as you’ve prepared in advance.
I highly recommend GISEC for anyone considering Cybersecurity in the GCC region. For Sasa Software, it’s an important market, with a strong base of energy, oil & gas, manufacturing, finance sector, and governmental organizations. The business environment is excellent – I was continually impressed with the level of professionalism of the delegates we met. It’s clear the region attracts, hires, and educates world-class IT security professionals.
Dubai and the UAE are of course a wonder of economic growth. The transformation the region underwent in just a couple of decades is inspiring. It’s an honor and pleasure for us at Sasa Software to cooperate with and protect our strategic allies. To introduce solutions protecting top-tier organizations in Israel and globally, providing security that will enable expansion and safe operations given the continually escalating threat landscape.
Learn more about our OT/ICS security solutions here.