Hello listeners. Today we are releasing another episode in our series entitled Menting Unicorns, Blockchain, AI, and Dubai, sponsored by the Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism, or DET.

Dubai is the new global center of gravity, connecting the world in a way few places can. From flexible regulations to tax incentives,

world-class infrastructure to access to global investors managing a trillion dollars in investment

money, Dubai understands what businesses need to scale fast. Today we are speaking with Dr. Marwan

Al-Zaruni, CEO of AI for the Dubai Department of Economy and Tourism.

Dr. Marwan is going to help walk us through how Dubai is creating a foundational hub for

AI, blockchain, and the intersection of both. Well, Dr. Marwan, thank you for being on Code Story.

Thank you for being on the show today. Thank you for having me, Noah.

Before we dive into all things Dubai and DET and AI and all that you're going to tell us today,

tell me and my audience a little bit more about you.

My name is Dr. Marwan Al-Zeroni. I'm the CEO of AI for Dubai Economy and Tourism Department in charge of

creating AI opportunities for Dubai startups as well as creating an ecosystem that is welcome

into this technology, as well as partnering with like-minded companies, like-minded talent as well

within Dubai and from abroad to make Dubai a global hub for AI.

I'm going to ask another way. Tell me what you do for fun. And maybe it's AI and blockchain.

That's cool. But tell me what you do for fun. It's both actually like you mentioned.

Dubai is one of the epicenters for innovation. Blockchain and AI, are both a great passion of mine.

And I've been an advocate for both for a really long time, even before the LLMs.

And it's really my passion to explore the edge of innovation where things are moving,

trend catching, trend watching, even within different spaces.

So for AI right now, AI agents is a

hot topic. And within the blockchain ecosystem, autonomous agents is an amazing topic right now,

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