Public First: Google Contributed AED 21.8 Billion to the UAE Economy in 2024
Google announced today the launch of the Google's Economic Impact Report, a report conducted by Public First research agency, that looks at how Google products (Search, Play, Maps, YouTube and Google Ads) have helped people, local businesses, content creators and developers in the UAE throughout 2024. Around the world, Google releases Impact Reports which are based on consumer and business polling, economic modeling, case studies and third party data. The report highlights how Google's AI-powered tools and platforms are profoundly enhancing daily life and productivity for individuals and enterprises across the UAE, driving macroeconomic growth. In fact, Public First estimates that Google contributed an estimated AED 21.8 billion to the UAE economy in 2024."We're incredibly proud to be a partner in the UAE's boundless ambitions," says Anthony Nakache, Managing Director for Google in the Middle East & North Africa. "The report reflects our investment in accelerating the country's ambitious journey towards a diversified, AI-powered economy. Through strategic investments, local partnerships, and our AI-powered tools, we're bringing substantial economic value and empowering individuals, businesses, and communities in the UAE.'Google is equipping people in the UAE with digital and AI capabilities needed for tomorrow's economy. The report highlights that since 2018, over 430,000 individuals in the UAE were trained in essential digital and AI skills through Google's key skilling initiative "Maharat Min Google" initiative. This effort includes empowering a diverse and vibrant ecosystem of developers. In 2024, the Android and Google Play app ecosystem supported the creation of 30,000 jobs in the UAE, according to the report. The Google Impact Report in the UAE explores the impact of Google's products in 2024 across three areas: People, Businesses and Communities. Below are the additional findings:Making everyday life easier for people in the UAE• AED 683 a month on average in consumer benefits is created by Google's services for the average person in the UAE.• 63% of adults in the UAE said they have used Gemini, Google's AI Assistant. • 90% of users agreed that Gemini helped them to be more productive. • 71% of users agreed that Gemini is easier to use in Arabic than other AI chatbots.• 50% of adults in the UAE agree that Google Search is essential to their daily lives.• 89% of adults in the UAE reported that Google Maps and/or Waze were very useful when they were avoiding getting lost.• 90% of adults in the UAE agreed that the ability to make contactless payments on mobile devices through the likes of GPay or GWallet makes their life easier.Fueling the Growth of Businesses in the UAE• 91% of businesses in the UAE report using at least one AI tool in their workflows.• 73% of 18-24 year olds said they use Google Search at least weekly to shop or browse products online.• 80% of adults in the UAE use Google Maps and/or Waze at least once a month to find a local business.• 86% said they checked Google reviews before visiting a venue or business at least once a month.• 94% of adults in the UAE use Google Search at least once a month to compare the prices of products and services.• 97% of public sector workers in the UAE said that Google AI-enabled tools help them to be more productive at work.Empowering Communities in the UAE This section of the report combines Public First research and Google internal data and estimates Google's contribution to creators, developers and publishers.• AED 455 million of revenue generated by the Android App Economy for UAE-based developers in 2024.• 600+ YouTube channels in the UAE have over 1 million subscribers, an increase of 15% year on year.• 20,000+ journalists and journalism students trained by the Google News Initiative in the MENA region, including in the UAE.About the researchGoogle commissioned independent consultancy Public First to explore how Google's innovations and products are helping communities, workers and businesses in the UAE, as well as the future potential of AI across the nation.
Public First conducted a survey of 1,110 online adults based in the UAE and a survey of 389 business leaders based in the UAE. These surveys were conducted in English and Arabic in March 2025. All results are weighted using Iterative Proportional Fitting, or 'Raking'. The online adult results are weighted by age, gender, education level, and region to nationally representative proportions.
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Al Bawaba
6 hours ago
- Al Bawaba
Public First: Google Contributed AED 21.8 Billion to the UAE Economy in 2024
Google announced today the launch of the Google's Economic Impact Report, a report conducted by Public First research agency, that looks at how Google products (Search, Play, Maps, YouTube and Google Ads) have helped people, local businesses, content creators and developers in the UAE throughout 2024. Around the world, Google releases Impact Reports which are based on consumer and business polling, economic modeling, case studies and third party data. The report highlights how Google's AI-powered tools and platforms are profoundly enhancing daily life and productivity for individuals and enterprises across the UAE, driving macroeconomic growth. In fact, Public First estimates that Google contributed an estimated AED 21.8 billion to the UAE economy in 2024."We're incredibly proud to be a partner in the UAE's boundless ambitions," says Anthony Nakache, Managing Director for Google in the Middle East & North Africa. "The report reflects our investment in accelerating the country's ambitious journey towards a diversified, AI-powered economy. Through strategic investments, local partnerships, and our AI-powered tools, we're bringing substantial economic value and empowering individuals, businesses, and communities in the UAE.'Google is equipping people in the UAE with digital and AI capabilities needed for tomorrow's economy. The report highlights that since 2018, over 430,000 individuals in the UAE were trained in essential digital and AI skills through Google's key skilling initiative "Maharat Min Google" initiative. This effort includes empowering a diverse and vibrant ecosystem of developers. In 2024, the Android and Google Play app ecosystem supported the creation of 30,000 jobs in the UAE, according to the report. The Google Impact Report in the UAE explores the impact of Google's products in 2024 across three areas: People, Businesses and Communities. Below are the additional findings:Making everyday life easier for people in the UAE• AED 683 a month on average in consumer benefits is created by Google's services for the average person in the UAE.• 63% of adults in the UAE said they have used Gemini, Google's AI Assistant. • 90% of users agreed that Gemini helped them to be more productive. • 71% of users agreed that Gemini is easier to use in Arabic than other AI chatbots.• 50% of adults in the UAE agree that Google Search is essential to their daily lives.• 89% of adults in the UAE reported that Google Maps and/or Waze were very useful when they were avoiding getting lost.• 90% of adults in the UAE agreed that the ability to make contactless payments on mobile devices through the likes of GPay or GWallet makes their life the Growth of Businesses in the UAE• 91% of businesses in the UAE report using at least one AI tool in their workflows.• 73% of 18-24 year olds said they use Google Search at least weekly to shop or browse products online.• 80% of adults in the UAE use Google Maps and/or Waze at least once a month to find a local business.• 86% said they checked Google reviews before visiting a venue or business at least once a month.• 94% of adults in the UAE use Google Search at least once a month to compare the prices of products and services.• 97% of public sector workers in the UAE said that Google AI-enabled tools help them to be more productive at Communities in the UAE This section of the report combines Public First research and Google internal data and estimates Google's contribution to creators, developers and publishers.• AED 455 million of revenue generated by the Android App Economy for UAE-based developers in 2024.• 600+ YouTube channels in the UAE have over 1 million subscribers, an increase of 15% year on year.• 20,000+ journalists and journalism students trained by the Google News Initiative in the MENA region, including in the the researchGoogle commissioned independent consultancy Public First to explore how Google's innovations and products are helping communities, workers and businesses in the UAE, as well as the future potential of AI across the nation. Public First conducted a survey of 1,110 online adults based in the UAE and a survey of 389 business leaders based in the UAE. These surveys were conducted in English and Arabic in March 2025. All results are weighted using Iterative Proportional Fitting, or 'Raking'. The online adult results are weighted by age, gender, education level, and region to nationally representative proportions.
Al Bawaba
8 hours ago
- Al Bawaba
Gartner Predicts 75% of Analytics Content to Use GenAI for Enhanced Contextual Intelligence by 2027
Seventy-five percent of new analytics content will be contextualized for intelligent applications through generative AI (GenAI) by 2027, enabling composable connection between insights and actions, according to Gartner, Inc.'We're moving from an era where analytic tools help business people make decisions, to a future where GenAI-powered analytics becomes perceptive and adaptive,' said Georgia O'Callaghan, Director, Analyst at Gartner. 'This will enable dynamic and autonomous decisions that have the potential to transform enterprise and consumer software, business processes and models.'A Gartner survey of 403 analytics or AI leaders, conducted between October and December 2024, revealed over 50% report their organizations use AI tools for automated insights and natural language queries (NLG) for analytics or AI development. Even with these capabilities, the static nature of current analytics often falls short of delivering in a truly dynamic and automated predicts augmented analytics capabilities will evolve into autonomous analytics platforms by 2027, which will fully manage and execute 20% of business processes. The perceptive future of analytics will deliver benefits by being proactive, collaborative, connected, contextual and continuous (see Figure 1).Figure 1: AI-Powered, Perceptive AnalyticsSource: Gartner (June 2025)'Perceptive analytics will use AI agents and other GenAI-fueled technologies to continuously monitor evolving conditions and perceive the target environment, such as market shifts, customer behavior changes or supply chain disruptions,' said O'Callaghan.'Guidance and analysis can then be autonomously adjusted in response, creating a more resilient and responsive analytical infrastructure. As these capabilities emerge and be adopted by organizations, their potential to reshape business operations and drive growth will only continue to expand.'Perceptive Analytics Overarching RiskAccording to Gartner research, the overarching risk that applies to perceptive analytics is the over reliance on autonomous actions without sufficient validation, which could result in unintended negative consequences, reputational damage and regulatory risk of "agent drift" is a serious concern, where a system's perceptions and actions gradually deviate from desired outcomes due to evolving data or unforeseen interactions. Guardian agents are emerging to deal with this inherent issue in AI systems, according to Gartner. These agents are specifically tasked with monitoring and enforcing policies and rules to ensure the systems operate within a set of guardrails. 'Building guardian agents will need to be a key focal point of new governance initiatives for data and analytics leaders, as agentic and perceptive analytics become the standard way of insight delivery across platforms,' said O'Callaghan.
Al Bawaba
11 hours ago
- Al Bawaba
Farzad Billimoria to join Barclays as Head of Private Bank for the UAE
Barclays today announces the appointment of Farzad Billimoria as Head of Private Bank for the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Farzad will be responsible for leading the Private Bank in the UAE, overseeing the local team and its governance, and driving the growth of the UAE business as a strategic hub for the broader Middle East region and international corridors. Based in Dubai, Farzad will join the bank on 1 July (subject to regulatory approval), reporting to Annabelle Bryde, Barclays' Head of Private Bank brings 30 years of expertise in financial services, including rich experience across Private Banking, Wealth Management and Retail Banking. Most recently, Farzad served as the Senior Executive Officer and Head of Private Bank for the UAE at HSBC where he drove the bank's strategy in the region. During his tenure and having lived in the UAE for over two decades, Farzad led a team that established HSBC Private Bank (Suisse) SA offices in the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Branch and Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM). He also launched the first onshore Private Bank booking centre for HSBC in the UAE. Additionally, he managed the growth of the Non Resident Indians (NRI) business in the region and has handled some of the UAE's largest ultra-high-net-worth (UHNW) client portfolios and relationships.'The Middle East presents significant growth opportunities for Barclays with its expanding influence on global markets and increasing wealth generation,' said Annabelle Bryde, Head of Private Bank International, Barclays. 'We are excited to welcome Farzad, who brings with him a strong blend of leadership and extensive local market experience. His appointment reflects our ambition to further elevate the importance and priority of the region, alongside accelerating our growth plans in the UAE.' Khaled El Dabag, CEO of Middle East and North Africa, Barclays added, 'We look forward to welcoming Farzad to the team and leveraging his experience and knowledge to continue to drive growth and deliver exceptional value to our clients.' © 2000 - 2025 Al Bawaba ( Signal PressWire is the world's largest independent Middle East PR distribution service.
