Saudi Arabia’s SME sector grows by 4.8% in Q1 2023

• Riyadh, the capital city of Saudi Arabia, is playing a crucial role in fostering a business-friendly environment and is home to over 41% of the country's SMEs
• One of the significant contributors to the growth of SMEs in Saudi Arabia was the Biban 23 forum, a global entrepreneurship event held in Riyadh in March

UAE space sector localization: Strata Manufacturing delivers MBZ-SAT Satellite components

• Strata Manufacturing will play a vital role by supplying locally built components for MBZ-SAT, the region's high-accuracy, high-resolution imaging satellite
• The satellite will be equipped with premium-grade aluminium honeycomb panels, ensuring resilience against extreme temperatures and radiation.

One in five people willing to work are jobless in low-income countries

Flat6Labs invests $10.2m in Abu Dhabi start-ups

• The program, in partnership with DisruptAD, the venture platform of ADQ, provides coaching, mentoring, and training to selected start-ups
• Over the past two years, the program has invested in 38 promising start-ups, with the majority (68 percent) based in the UAE

Saudi astronauts successfully complete space trip

• The spacecraft successfully landed in the Atlantic Ocean, marking the Kingdom's entry into the league of a small number of countries conducting space science missions
• The mission achieved the Kingdom's ambition to contribute to scientific research, to benefit from the promising opportunities offered by the global space sector and its industries

Palm Jumeirah penthouse sells for a staggering $60m

• The penthouse sold is on the topmost floor of AVA at Palm Jumeirah, Dorchester Collection, spanning a built-up area of 33,406 sq ft
• It also has a four-floor 200m indoor garden and a roof terrace with 360-degree views, making it the perfect spot for relaxing

UAE Corporate Tax: Ministry of Finance issues three new rules

• These include updated regulations for unincorporated partnerships, interest caps, and tax grouping
• The new decisions are an attempt to ensure that “the UAE's corporate tax regime maintains flexibility.”

Dubai events generated $3.53 bn economic output in 2022

• A substantial $2.01 billion (AED 7.4 billion) was retained within the local economy, showcasing the venue's strong contribution to Dubai's GDP
• The events organized at DWTC attracted nearly 1.2 million attendees, with 40 percent of them coming from international locations

Falcon 40B, UAE’s  open-source AI model ranks No 1 on Hugging Face’s Leaderboard

• Falcon 40B managed to beat back established models such as LLaMA from Meta (including its 65B model), StableLM from Stability AI, and RedPajama from Together
• Hugging Face’s Open LLM Leaderboard is an objective tool open to the AI community that tracks, ranks, and evaluates LLMs and chatbots as they are launched

Holiday homes in Dubai to get ‘QR Code’ to improve transparency

• As part of the initiative, owners of Holiday Homes will now be required to display a QR code on the main entrances of their vacation properties in Dubai
• This code enables visitors and guests to conveniently scan it and access essential information about the operator of the Holiday Home