Doha, Qatar: Qatar Research, Development, and Innovation (QRDI) Council as part of its ongoing efforts to strengthen the bonds between the RDI Ecosystem in Qatar and globally participated at London Tech Week (LTW) 2024 as the Global Innovation Partner. 

Bringing together 45,000 attendees across the week, including corporates, startups, investors, and policymakers, London Tech Week was a unique opportunity to showcase Qatar’s thought leadership and value propositions in the technology and innovation space. The event took place between June 10 and 12, 2024, in Olympia, London, UK.

The QRDI Council delegation, accompanied by leaders from Qatar Investment Authority, Invest Qatar, Qatar Development Bank, Milaha, and Qatar University, engaged in critical discussions with international counterparts, underscoring Qatar’s commitment to fostering a robust Research, Development, and Innovation (RDI) ecosystem.

As part of the Global Leaders Innovation Summit, at London Tech Week 2024, QRDI Council led a roundtable session on June 10th, 2024, titled “Responsible & Inclusive Tech: How do we build and sustain an inclusive tech ecosystem?”. The invite-only event session involved key innovation leaders to discuss technology-driven innovations’ impact on people’s lives and work, and to address how to approach mitigating the negative impact of these innovations without slowing their pace. 

Also, on the first day of the LTW, Dr. Abdulaziz Khalid Al Ali from Qatar University spoke in the panel discussion “The Power of AI to Transform Industries”, in which discourse revolved around the transformative power of artificial intelligence (AI) and its implications on productivity, efficiency and business success.

On the second day, June 11, 2024, QRDI Council’s Chief Advisor for Innovation and Enterprise, Dr Maher Hakim, delivered 2 sessions. The first one, titled “Technology Innovation: It Is Not All Rosy” highlighted the threats caused by technology innovation and the need of new approaches and tools to steer collective investments in future technologies and innovations. Then his second session “Financing Your Startup: There are a lot more options than you think!”, showcased the types of startups and startup stages in addition to sharing the various sources of financing available to entrepreneurs globally and in Qatar.

Milaha’s Vice-President of Container Shipping Peter Verheijen spoke in the panel discussion about “Green Supply Chains – Driving Decarbonisation at Scale”, discussing key points including transport decarbonization, lower carbon supply chains, accelerating zero-emissions transitions, and circular supply chains. Also, QDB’s Senior Manager of Investment Mohammed Al-Emadi contributed to the session, titled “Does Place Matter? Where To Found a Startup and How To Go Global”, discussing the various options startups should consider as they think of going global, particularly what is available in Qatar.