The Oman Business Forum offered on May 3rd its members a chance to meet representatives of the Mittelstand, Germany’s economic backbone, to foster their mutual acquaintance and explore reciprocally beneficial business opportunities, particularly around business applications of artificial intelligence.

The working lunch, organised in close collaboration with the Omani office of the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, was moderated by Sharifa Al Barami, Managing Director of the Oman Technology Fund. Delegates of three Bavarian Mittelstand companies, led by Dr Dalia Abu Samra-Rohte, Representative of the State of Bavaria Emirates Office, gave brief presentations of their companies and products to a select group of OBF members and invited guests, representatives of Omani businesses and technology-investment institutions.

Dr. Stefan Kaneff, Managing Director of Euros Embedded Systems, described his company’s systems for secure cloud connectivity for industrial Internet of Things and his highly advanced, AI-driven translation software for natural languages, as well as portable real-time operating systems. He also offered apprenticeships for Omani youths in his company in Germany. Dr. Maria Athelogou presented Definiens’s Cognition Network Technology, which makes it possible to extract knowledge from histological images. Powered by artificial intelligence, the system can be used to detect prognostic biomarkers in personalised medicine. Iris Meinl offered her consultancy services to help companies adopt artificial intelligence in their products and processes.

Germany’s Mittelstand can offer Omani companies a wide range of opportunities. Defined loosely as small and medium-sized companies that are either family owned or run under a family-like corporate culture (and therefore include such large companies as Bosch), they account for 99.98% of the 3.7 million companies in Germany. The remaining 0.2% are the internationally better-known giants such as Siemens, BMW, Daimler, BASF, SAP, Volkswagen, Allianz and Bayer, amongst others. Intent on learning to do one particular thing really well, which makes them focus on innovative and high-value manufactured products, many of the Mittelstand companies have come to dominate up to 90% of the global market in their respective niches. Their emphasis on long-term profitability translates into a cautious, long-term-oriented approach to business.

Today, the Mittelstand is faced with questions about how it will adapt to the digital revolution of the 21st century, which it is tackling head on in order to stay relevant. It is not surprise that it was Germany, through its National Academy of Science and Engineering, that introduced the concept of "Industrie 4.0", back in 2013. With Oman now also engaged in gearing itself for the 4th Industrial Revolution, there is great potential for extended collaboration between local companies and the German Mittelstand’s hidden champions. The Oman Business Forum will endeavour to capitalise on these opportunities more easily and make them available to our members, to the ultimate socio-economic benefit of the Sultanate.