Saudi Arabia, June 15 2016 - Software AG, a global leader in digital business technologies and solutions around business processes management, integration, adaptive applications, enterprise architecture management and big data, successfully concluded its flagship ARIS User Day event in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia which received overwhelming nationwide participation of ARIS users, who learned and networked with experts, customers and partners. Held across key ARIS user locations across the world, the event was held for the first time in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia,  

The event, held at the Four Seasons Hotel, Riyadh, was organized by Software AG’s regional office to ensure its customers and partners are up to date with the latest developments around Business and IT Transformation and the ARIS platform at the heart of it. The sessions provided the attendees with an interactive platform to discuss relevant topics, common interests, and latest digitization trends and their impact on their business transformation and operational excellence.  

Ahmad Salama, Vice President, Software AG - Saudi Arabia, said: “At Software AG we are very glad with the positive response to such a prestigious gathering in Riyadh. The participants actively exchanged experiences and knowledge not only with our team but also with their like-minded peers and invited guest speakers during this one-day event. We are confident that their fruitful collaboration and dialogues will help them adapt their Enterprise Architecture and Business Processes to be more customer and citizen centric as opposed to being product and service centric. This is through sharing state-of-the-art techniques and methodologies that help our customers unleash the potential of Software AG’s Business & IT Transformation (BITT) Platform with ARIS as its corner stone”     

Experts from Software AG, their customers and partners addressed the event. The event keynote on ’What Digitization means for Industries’ was delivered by Sven Roeleven, Vice President, Industry Solutions - Software AG. He followed this with two more interesting presentations on ‘Designing for the Digital Customer - Customer Experience Management’ and ’Governance, Risk & Compliance with ARIS.’

Speaking for Devoteam, the Platinum Sponsor for the event, Abdallah Kadi, Partner – Devoteam, tackled the subject of customer expectation management with his presentation titled ‘Digital Transformation in the Customer Era’.

Speaking for Wipro, the gold sponsor for the event and a global Software AG partner, Ahmed Hussain, Practice Partner – Wipro, talked about the need of incorporating design thinking aspects in Business Process design.

The event hosted interactive ‘Walk-the-Talk’ sessions for selected Software AG’s customers who were invited for face-to-face interviews on stage to share their experiences about Software AG’s Business & IT Transformation platform which includes ARIS and Alfabet products. The customers revealed their business challenges that needed to be addressed, how they went about the implementation, and the key benefits derived. The sessions featured Mr. Fawaz Al Twaijri, Head of Systems Development from Tawuniya Insurance; Eng. Abdullah Alotaibi, Head of Enterprise Architecture & Planning at the National Information Center (NIC), Dr. Mohamed Benaichouche, CIO from Arabsat; and Mr. Peter Harris - Independent Risk Management Consultant. On behalf of Software AG, the ‘Walk-the-Talk’ interviews were hosted by Mohamed Masood Dawood, Ahmed Talaat, and Ahmed AlMahdy from the company’s local Saudi team.

The event also hosted a panel discussion, featuring participation from leading Saudi Arabian organizations to discuss ‘Business & IT Transformation in the Digital Era’. The panel was moderated by Ahmad Salama from Software AG and featured panellists from Software AG customers, partners and independent consultants. During the panel discussion, an industry leader Software AG customer “Tawuniya Insurance” have shared their perspective on managing successful digital transformation and its effect on the business. Also a senior independent Governance Risk and Compliance consultant explained how to mitigate the risks associated with the unlimited possibilities of citizen and customer interactions the Digital transformation brings, without affecting the business objectives and performance. Abdullah Amara, Country Manager – Devoteam and Muralidhara Honnur, GM – Wipro have participated in the panel discussion as well giving the consulting and implementation partner’s perspective.

Software AG presented the ARIS product roadmap and features of the upcoming release. Emad Abugharbieh along with Hussam Hiassat from Software AG presented the product roadmap and also tested the audiences’ awareness on ARIS with quizzes.

The event drew the participation of more than 80 delegates. The session was made possible with the support of strategic partners, including Devoteam Middle East as the Platinum Sponsor, Wipro Arabia Ltd. as the Gold Sponsor, and Azeemi Technologies as the Bronze Sponsor. 

The ARIS User Day was held in Riyadh, following a similar event held in Dubai on May 4, 2016. A similar event is scheduled to be held in June 2016 in Istanbul, Turkey.