The QU Wireless Innovations Center (QUWIC), an applied research and development entity founded by Qatar University in collaboration with and at Qatar Science & Technology Park, has been rebranded as Qatar Mobility Innovations Center (QMIC).

“The new name reflects our unique positioning and supports our objective in creating differentiated platforms and services that will translate into knowledge-based ventures in Qatar,” QMIC chairman Abdulla al-Talib said yesterday.

QMIC executive director Dr Adnan Abu-Dayya said the rebranding highlights the focus on delivering innovations to the market and the emphasis on important and emerging mobility trends.

“QMIC will focus on the use of mobile and wireless technologies to create innovations,” he said adding mobility represents a lifestyle that requires a new breed of solutions, business models and services.

Since its launch in 2009, QUWIC has developed solutions and initiatives including the Intelligent Sensing and M2M Services Platform (Labeeb), the Intelligent Transportation and Logistics Services (Masarak), Environmental Air Quality Monitoring System (Hawa’ak), Arabic eContent delivery platform (Kutobi) and Connected Car Platform and applications.

“We have filed four patent applications and published about 50 papers,” Dr Abu-Dayya said asserting that QMIC is now focusing on positioning itself as the regional leader in mobility innovations.

Earlier this month, QUWIC participated and performed successfully at the second Co-operative Mobility Services Interoperability Testing in Versailles, France.

The aim of the event was to create an opportunity for companies to test their prototypes against the Co-operative ITS Communication standards with their partners and competitors.

QUWIC took part in the first CMS Interoperability testing last November in the Netherlands. At the latest event, which included new and more complex test cases, QUWIC was one of the 13 participants from across the globe.

QUWIC’s Connected Car platform, which has safety applications at its core, was successfully tested in France against prototypes of other big companies in the field.

“Connected Car is a work in progress, moving from the platform to the application side. About 18 months more are needed, following which QMIC would work with national partners for implementing pilot programmes,” Dr Abu-Dayya said.

QMIC will own the technologies it creates, al-Talib said while observing that the full cycle of starting with an idea to commercialising it is to be handled by the institution.

“The new brand name was necessitated by the confusion that existed regarding QUWIC’s identity in relation to two areas,” Dr Abu-Dayya clarified.

It was sometimes mistaken as an academic institution that focuses on pure research and focusing on creating wireless technologies.

“The new brand name truly represents the smart living innovations that QMIC focuses on building and reconfirms its positioning as a unique applied research and development and commercialisation centre,” he said.

Given that mobility represents a major driver for innovations as it is fuelling convergence of mega industries, QMIC will focus on the use of mobile technologies to develop and deploy innovations.

QMIC will continue to be owned by Qatar University and have the same management as QUWIC.

The new red and green logo symbolises environment-friendly innovations for smart living. Red denotes power, strength and passion, whereas green stands for QMIC’s environment-friendly innovations that provide smart living services.

QMIC’s business development and marketing head Omar Bondogi and business development manager Omar al-Jaber were also present at the announcement of the new brand identity.