Emirates signs MoUs with three teams from Dubai Future Accelerators programme

Emirates signing ceremonyEmirates has demonstrated its commitment to fostering innovation in the global aviation industry by signing MoUs with three teams from the sixth cohort of the Dubai Future Accelerators (DFA) programme. The companies, hailing from the USA, Germany and the UK, were selected from the pool of seven participant teams that worked with Emirates through DFA for nine weeks between March and May 2019. The MoUs were signed by Adel Al Redha,  Executive Vice President and Chief Operations Officer, Emirates,  and by representatives from the shortlisted companies — Opinsta (UK), Predapp (Germany) and Verusen (USA).

Emirates joined the DFA programme in 2017. In what was a first earlier this year, Emirates and the Dubai Future Foundation announced that all the teams participating in the sixth cohort of the DFA programme would be dedicated to addressing three challenges set forth by Emirates in the domains of B2B procurement, seamless customer experience, and an integrated system for crew duty travel. The teams from Cohort 6 of the DFA programme worked with stakeholders from Emirates to map out requirements, refine their proposals and develop prototype solutions. Opinsta, Predapp and Verusen were chosen based on the fit of their proposed solutions, and broader application and scalability within Emirates.

Adel Al Redha said, “Over the course of nine weeks, the interactions between the teams at Emirates as well as the participants of Cohort 6 of the Dubai Future Accelerators programme have resulted in a number of options we can explore to address the challenges we had defined.”

Khalfan Belhoul, CEO at Dubai Future Foundation, said, “The MoUs signed today are the outcome of DFA’s offering of an ideal setting for Emirates, the world’s largest international airline, along with the brightest and most innovative minds, to work hand in hand in finding transformative solutions to key challenges in the aviation industry.”