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Jordan Times
10 hours ago
- Business
- Jordan Times
EMV workshops conclude with sectoral roadmaps, progress review
AMMAN — A 12-day series of sectoral workshops concluded on Monday, aiming at evaluating the first phase of Jordan's Economic Modernisation Vision (EMV) (2023–2025) and drafting recommendations for the second phase (2026–2029). Hosted at the Royal Court, the workshops brought together approximately 400 participants, including experts, representatives from the private sector, civil society members, academics, and media professionals. The sessions reviewed the implementation of the first phase, examining strengths, challenges, impact indicators and key initiatives outlined in the executive programme across multiple economic sectors, the Jordan News Agency, Petra, reported. The workshops sought to provide actionable recommendations for the government, which is expected to hold follow-up sessions in preparation for the next executive programme. The goal is to refine high-impact initiatives and ensure that economic sectors keep pace with international, technological and policy developments. Priority sectors covered during the discussions included financial services, water, transport and logistics, social protection, creative industries, tourism, agriculture and food security, health, education, green growth, industry and trade, urban development, energy, investment, mining, and information and communications technology.
Entrepreneur
2 days ago
- Business
- Entrepreneur
Abu Dhabi Chamber Membership Surpasses 158,000 in H1 2025, Marking 4.9% Growth
You're reading Entrepreneur Middle East, an international franchise of Entrepreneur Media. The Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ADCCI) has reported a notable 4.9% year-on-year increase in its membership base, surpassing 158,000 registered companies by the end of the first half of 2025. The growth reflects continued momentum in the emirate's business landscape, driven by both emerging and traditional sectors. According to the Chamber, membership climbed from 157,207 in September 2024 to over 158,000 by June 2025. The sharpest increases were seen in sectors such as agriculture, which recorded a 21% surge in membership, followed by arts and entertainment at 13%, and information and communication technology (ICT) and technical services at nearly 10%. Additional strong performers included water and waste management (9%), property and administrative services (8%), education (7%), transport and storage (6%), and mining and quarrying (5%). Meanwhile, more established industries such as construction, manufacturing, and financial services posted steady growth of around 2–3%. The Chamber attributed the rise in membership to Abu Dhabi's proactive business climate, sectoral diversification, and government initiatives aimed at bolstering private sector participation. "Surpassing 158,000 member companies underscores the growing confidence in Abu Dhabi as a dynamic business hub," said a spokesperson for the ADCCI. "We remain committed to supporting sustainable growth and facilitating opportunities across all sectors." The Chamber's expanding membership base signals robust economic resilience and growing investor interest in the UAE capital, aligning with the government's long-term economic vision.
Jordan Times
2 days ago
- Business
- Jordan Times
EMV investment workshop focuses on driving sustainable economic growth, job creation
AMMAN — The Economic Modernisation Vision (EMV) workshops continued on Sunday at the Royal Hashemite Court with a focus on the investment sector, highlighting its role in driving sustainable economic growth and job creation, especially for youth. The workshop brought together representatives from government institutions, the private sector and civil society to review the progress achieved in the investment sector and identify priorities for the next phase of the EMV. The investment engine is a 'strategic and pivotal' pillar in supporting and achieving the objectives of the EMV by focusing its efforts on attracting local and foreign investments, improving the business environment and developing policies to accelerate the pace of benefiting from investments. It also contributes to creating an attractive investment environment in the Kingdom, which stimulates economic growth and opens wider horizons for providing job opportunities and developing productive sectors. Participants discussed Jordan's advantages, including its strategic geographical location as a gateway between Europe, Asia and Africa, bilateral investment agreements and free trade agreements (FTAs) with major markets such as the EU, the US, Arab Gulf states, Agadir and Singapore. They also pointed to providing competitive incentives in development zones, free zones, and special economic zones, as well as promising sectors with significant investment potential, such as digital economy, green hydrogen, logistics, gas, mining, industry and life sciences. The strengths of Jordan is also represented in the political stability that encourages investment, and having a young, educated, and tech-savvy workforce, in addition to enjoying the freedom to transfer capital and withdraw profits, especially that the Jordanian dinar is pegged to the US dollar. Key goals of the EMV include attracting investments worth JD41 billion (JD18 billion foreign direct investments, JD12 billion of domestic direct investment, and JD11 billion of government direct investment) by 2033. Other objectives are related to creating economic and employment opportunities to absorb more than one million young men and women in the labour market, and supporting development goals. The EMV also outlines efforts to support establishing Jordan's position as a regional centre of excellence for effective and sustainable investment, as well as enhancing Jordan's competitiveness in attracting foreign direct investment in priority sectors, such as ICT, green energy, pharmaceutical industries, tourism and logistics. The most prominent initiatives of the investment engine in the first phase include improving Jordan's rank in international indicators and reports, creating and developing new and innovative financing partnership models with the private sector, improving the investment environment in the Kingdom and developing its components. More initiatives pertain to development of an effective strategy to communicate with local and international investors, and launch an integrated promotional campaign programme, attracting and stimulating local and foreign investments, developing a comprehensive investor database, and establishing a system for managing integrated investor relations. Most prominent achievements for the investment engine for the first phase include boosting the legislative and regulatory framework that attracts investment, developing digital infrastructure and improving government services for investors, and effective promotion of quality investment opportunities. More achievements include improving investor experience and enhance post-establishment services, and boosting local and regional partnerships to implement quality projects, providing incentives and reducing investment costs, in addition to financial stimulus and revitalisation of international cooperation. Despite this progress, attendees of the workshop noted that challenges remain. Partner and General Manager of Abu-Haltam Group for Investments Iyad Abu Haltam said that the EMV has more than 350 initiatives throughout its 10-year span, noting that the progress rate in the implementation over the past three years varies between different sectors. He added: 'The progress in some sectors was less than 30 per cent, some achieved around 60 per cent, while others made a progress of 10 to 15 per cent.' The main reasons behind slow progress can be attributed to the turbulence in the region including the war on Gaza and the turbulence in the supply chain through Bab Al Mandeb Strait, Abu Haltam noted. He pointed: "We should have a proper and structured way of the dialogue between the private and the public sectors regarding any newly introduced laws or bylaws." Managing Partner of SME Investment Fund Jameel Anz said in terms of challenges: "The entire domain is challenged by a lot of factors, whether it's financing, access to finance, access to capital, access to resources, the geopolitical environment." Anz added: "SMEs do face, but sometimes at a larger scale, a higher tendency to break because of their size. At the same time, SMEs do face a challenge when it comes to corporate governance because all of these companies are friends and family based, so corporate governance is an issue." He said: "Sustainability and continuity of the companies is also an issue. So part of helping promote and sustain these companies is to help them with access to finance, help them with capacity building, moving them out of the friends and family [atmosphere] into a more corporate structure." "Solutions for SMEs are capacity building. Access to finance and corporate governance are others." Anz noted.
Times of Oman
3 days ago
- Business
- Times of Oman
Ministerial decision issued on periodic bonuses for Omani Workers
Muscat: The Ministry of Labour (MoL) has issued Ministerial Decision No. 317/2025 concerning the determination of the minimum periodic bonus and the regulation of its disbursement to Omani employees working in the private sector. Article Two: Without prejudice to any superior benefits granted to the employee, an Omani worker is entitled to a periodic bonus on 1 January each year, provided that they have been employed at the establishment for at least six months. This bonus shall be based on the outcome of their performance evaluation, and shall be paid at a minimum rate as follows: 5 per cent of the basic salary if the worker receives an 'Excellent' evaluation. 4 per cent of the basic salary if the worker receives a 'Very Good' evaluation. 3 per cent of the basic salary if the worker receives a 'Good' evaluation. 2 per cent of the basic salary if the worker receives an 'Acceptable' evaluation. The worker shall not be entitled to a periodic bonus if they receive a 'Poor' performance evaluation. In all cases, the employee has the right to appeal the result of their performance evaluation to the relevant administrative division within the Ministry. Article Three: In applying the provisions of Article 50 of the Labour Law, the establishment in which the employee has spent the longest period of one year shall be responsible for preparing the performance report. The establishment to which the employee is transferred shall be obligated to pay the periodic bonus due. Article Four: The employer may reduce the periodic bonus if the establishment can demonstrate an economic justification for doing so, provided that approval is granted by the committee referred to in Article 45 of the Labour Law. Article Five: The employer may suspend the periodic bonus in the following cases: 1. If the employee is accused of committing a misdemeanour or felony in the workplace and is referred for investigation by the competent authorities. Should a final judgment acquit the employee, the establishment shall be obligated to pay the suspended periodic bonuses in accordance with the provisions of this decision. 2. If the employee takes unpaid leave under the provisions of Articles 80 and 83 of the Labour Law, or is absent from work for more than six months during the year in which the periodic bonus is calculated. Article Six: The periodic bonus shall continue to be paid to the employee once the reason for its reduction or suspension ceases, in accordance with the provisions of this decision.
Yahoo
3 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Buy 3 Cybersecurity Stocks to Strengthen Portfolio Security in 2H25
Cybersecurity encompasses comprehensive security measures designed to protect systems, networks and programs from digital attacks. These attacks often aim to access, alter, or destroy sensitive information, extort money from users through ransomware, or disrupt the integrity of normal business operations. This space focuses on companies that offer integrated protection against evolving security threats while simplifying IT security infrastructure. Cybersecurity companies provide solutions to safeguard applications, networks, and cloud computing environments. Their offerings include application-specific integrated circuits, hardware architecture, operating systems, and associated security and networking functions, ensuring robust defenses against cyberattacks. The widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI), IoT devices, and increased digitization across both public and private sectors has heightened vulnerabilities and expanded attack surfaces, necessitating the development of advanced security solutions. We recommend three cybersecurity stocks for the rest of 2025 to strengthen your portfolio. These are CyberArk Software Ltd. CYBR, Okta Inc. OKTA and Fortinet Inc. FTNT. Each of our picks carries either a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy) or 2 (Buy). You can see the complete list of today's Zacks #1 Rank stocks here. The chart below shows the price performance of our three picks in the past three months. Image Source: Zacks Investment Research CyberArk Software Ltd. Zacks Rank #1 CyberArk Software is benefiting from the rising demand for cybersecurity and privileged access security solutions due to the long list of data breaches and increasing digital transformation strategies. A strong presence across verticals, such as banking, healthcare, government and utilities, is safeguarding CYBR from the adverse effects of softening IT spending. CYBR's strategic mix shift toward software-as-a-service and subscription-based solutions is driving top-line growth. CyberArk is gaining customer accounts, which contributes to its revenues. The vast customer base presents the company with an opportunity to upsell products within its installed user base. Furthermore, in the last few quarters, CYBR has been able to close a significant number of seven-figure deals. The growing number of large deals in the revenue mix is helpful as it increases deferred revenues and visibility. Moreover, any product refresh brings in additional dollars as every enterprise attempts to keep its threat management infrastructure updated. These factors in turn support CYBR's top line. CyberArk Software has an expected revenue and earnings growth rate of 31.9% and 26.4%, respectively, for the current year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for current-year earnings has improved 4.9% in the last 60 days. Okta Inc. Zacks Rank #2 Okta operates as an identity partner in the United States and internationally. OKTA offers a suite of products and services used to manage and secure identities, such as Single Sign-On, which enables users to access applications in the cloud or on-premises from various devices. OKTA also provides Universal Directory, a cloud-based system of record to store and secure user, application, and device profiles for an organization. OKTA's Adaptive Multi-Factor Authentication provides a layer of security for cloud, mobile, web applications, and data, while API Access Management enables organizations to secure APIs. Access Gateway allows organizations to extend Workforce Identity Cloud, and Okta Device Access enables end users to securely log in to devices with Okta credentials. OKTA has expected revenue and earnings growth rates of 9.4% and 16.7%, respectively, for the current year (ending January 2026). The Zacks Consensus Estimate for current-year earnings has improved 2.8% over the last 60 days. Fortinet Inc. Zacks Rank #2 Fortinet is benefiting from rising demand from large enterprise customers and growth in the company's security subscriptions. FTNT is also gaining from the robust growth in Fortinet Security Fabric, cloud and Software-defined Wide Area Network offerings. Higher IT spending on cybersecurity is further expected to aid FTNT in growing faster than the security market. We expect 2025 net sales to rise 13.1% from 2024. FTNT has a strong balance sheet that bodes well for investors. The focus on enhancing its unified threat management portfolio through product development and acquisitions is a tailwind for the company. Fortinet has expected revenue and earnings growth rates of 13.3% and 4.6%, respectively, for the current year. The Zacks Consensus Estimate for current-year earnings has improved 0.4% over the last 60 days. Want the latest recommendations from Zacks Investment Research? Today, you can download 7 Best Stocks for the Next 30 Days. Click to get this free report Fortinet, Inc. (FTNT) : Free Stock Analysis Report CyberArk Software Ltd. (CYBR) : Free Stock Analysis Report Okta, Inc. (OKTA) : Free Stock Analysis Report This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research ( Zacks Investment Research Sign in to access your portfolio
