How the 6G band in the UAE could triple network capacity on existing towers
Eagle Hills eyes 2027 construction start on $20 billion Maldives project
What Qatar’s new dual-tranche sovereign USD bond means for Gulf markets
Why Mbappé leaves Nike for On, and what his equity deal means for boots
Why AI won’t end the world, says Nvidia’s Huang, as four AI labs are sued
Why Saudi Arabia exits mBridge and who governs the China-led platform now
Why Ben Affleck replaced Jennifer Garner in his Netflix thriller Animals
Education as Economic Infrastructure in the UAE
EDITION 003 SEPTEMBER 2026
Sheikh Khaled chairs Abu Dhabi Council’s first meeting powered by agentic AI
What Meta One in the UAE means for WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook users
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The case for the 6G band in the UAE rests on a small number: two to five percent. That is how far an Upper 6 GHz signal falls behind today’s 3.5 GHz C-band in reach. The modelling covered city centres, towns, suburbs and open country. Higher frequencies normally travel less far, and shorter reach normally […]
- By Rami Al-Saadi
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- Qatar
What Qatar’s new dual-tranche sovereign USD bond means for Gulf markets
- By Yousef Haddad
- 3 min read
- Abu Dhabi
Sheikh Khaled chairs Abu Dhabi Council’s first meeting powered by agentic AI
- By Mariam Al-Yazidi
- 3 min read
- Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia’s Inflation Rate Holds Steady as Housing Costs Ease
- By Amira Khalil
- 4 min read
- AI Investments
UAE’s €40 billion investment in Germany targets AI, energy and industry deals
- By Khaled Darwish
- 3 min read
- Qatar
What Qatar’s new dual-tranche sovereign USD bond means for Gulf markets
- By Yousef Haddad
- 3 min read
- Abu Dhabi
Sheikh Khaled chairs Abu Dhabi Council’s first meeting powered by agentic AI
- By Mariam Al-Yazidi
- 3 min read
- Saudi Arabia
Saudi Arabia’s Inflation Rate Holds Steady as Housing Costs Ease
- By Amira Khalil
- 4 min read
- AI Investments
UAE’s €40 billion investment in Germany targets AI, energy and industry deals
- By Khaled Darwish
- 3 min read
- Bahrain
Youth City 2030: Bahrain’s Human-Capital Investment in the Generation Building the Future Economy
- By Mohamed Almusawi
- 13–15 min read
- Government
His Highness Sheikh Dr Sultan bin Mohammed Al Qasimi approved an AED 20,000 monthly decent living floor
- By Mariam Al-Yazidi
- 3 min read
- Etihad Airways
Etihad launches Etihad Escapes to extend travel experience beyond flights
Etihad Airways has unveiled Etihad Escapes, a new travel platform designed to extend the Etihad experience beyond the flight and make it easier for guests to plan and book more of their journey in one place. Announced at Arabian Travel Market (ATM) 2026 in Dubai, Etihad Escapes will launch in October, initially allowing guests with […]
- By Leila Al-Khatib
- 2 min read
- Real Estate
For thousands of Maldivian families, a $20 billion Maldives project now stands between where they live today and a new home by
- By Amira Khalil
- 3 min read
- META
What Meta One in the UAE means for WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook users
- By Fatima Al-Nouri
- 4 min read
- Tabby
Why a $233 million Series F round now puts Tabby at $6.5 billion valuation
- By Mariam Al-Yazidi
- 4 min read
- ICN BUSINESS Magazine
UAE business accelerators 2026: what founders get and what they give up
- By Leila Al-Khatib
- 9 min read
- Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy
- By Tariq Al-Mansouri
- 3 min read
Dubai to Train 14,000 Companies With New Dubai Agentic AI Training Programme
- Real Estate
Eagle Hills eyes 2027 construction start on $20 billion Maldives project
- By Amira Khalil
- 3 min read
- META
What Meta One in the UAE means for WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook users
- By Fatima Al-Nouri
- 4 min read
- Tabby
Why a $233 million Series F round now puts Tabby at $6.5 billion valuation
- By Mariam Al-Yazidi
- 4 min read
- ICN BUSINESS Magazine
UAE business accelerators 2026: what founders get and what they give up
- By Leila Al-Khatib
- 9 min read
- Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy
Dubai to Train 14,000 Companies With New Dubai Agentic AI Training Programme
- By Tariq Al-Mansouri
- 3 min read
- Entrepreneur
How Founders Build Discipline By Designing Systems That Beat Willpower
- By Salma Al-Tamimi
- 3 min read
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- US Open
What the US Open women’s final means for Rybakina and Sabalenka
The US Open women’s final on Saturday will settle a trophy but not a ranking. Elena Rybakina and Aryna Sabalenka walk onto Arthur Ashe Stadium at 4 p.m. ET as the top two players in the world, and the order between them has already been fixed by the WTA rankings. Rybakina becomes No. 1 on Monday regardless of the score.
That outcome was decided on Thursday. By reaching the semifinals, Rybakina collected enough points to overtake Sabalenka, who has held the top spot for 99 consecutive weeks. She then beat Coco Gauff 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 in the night session to book her place. Sabalenka had already dispatched Jessica Pegula 7-5, 6-2 earlier in the day, hitting 29 winners to Pegula’s 12.
Two players, two different claims
Sabalenka arrives with the stronger record in New York. She has won the tournament in each of the past two years, and this is her fourth consecutive US Open final, a run last managed by Serena Williams in 2014. Nobody has beaten her at Flushing Meadows since Gauff did so in the 2023 final. A win on Saturday would make her the third woman in the Open Era to take three straight US Open titles.
Rybakina’s case rests on the season as a whole. She opened 2026 by beating Sabalenka in the Australian Open final, 6-4, 4-6, 6-4, and she won the WTA Finals at the end of last year. Her record at this event had been modest, with a fourth-round exit her previous best. She also arrived carrying an injury that forced her to retire from Cincinnati in August. A third Grand Slam title here would make her the sixth woman since 1988 to win both hard-court majors in the same year.
The Sabalenka vs Rybakina head-to-head record runs to 17 matches. Only two were Grand Slam finals, both in Melbourne. Sabalenka won in 2023. Rybakina won in January. Saturday breaks the tie. Sabalenka also beat Rybakina in the Indian Wells final in March, saving a championship point along the way.
Who governs the money in the US Open women’s final
The purse tells its own story about who sets the terms. This year the United States Tennis Association lifted total US Open prize money to $108 million, a 20 percent rise on the $90 million paid in 2025. The singles champion earns $5.5 million, up from $5 million last year and the largest winner’s payout at any Grand Slam. Second place pays $2.8 million.
On the ranking side, the system works differently. The WTA rankings, now carrying the name of Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, award 2,000 points to the champion and 1,300 to the finalist. Those points are fixed by the tour, not by the tournament, and they explain why the No. 1 question closed before the final began. Rybakina needed to reach the last four. She did.
That distinction matters for how the result should be read. The USTA controls the cheque, and the WTA controls the crown. On Saturday, only one of those bodies still has something to hand out.
What the US Open women’s final means for the rest of 2026
Three different women have won this year’s first three majors: Rybakina in Melbourne, Mirra Andreeva in Paris and Linda Noskova at Wimbledon. Sabalenka has none in 2026, and the US Open women’s final is her last chance to change that. A Sabalenka win would put her back on the board and keep New York her stronghold even as the ranking slips. Should Rybakina win, one player would hold two of the four majors and the No. 1 spot at once, a combination nobody else on tour can claim.
The final airs on ESPN in the United States. Whichever way it goes, the US Open women’s final closes a season in which the top of the women’s game changed hands on points rather than on a single match. Saturday offers the two players a chance to argue the point in person.
- Manny Pacquiao
Pacquiao replaces Lope Santos III and will coordinate poverty programmes across national agencies
The Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role places the former senator at the head of the agency that coordinates anti-poverty policy across the Philippine government. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administered his oath at Malacañang and gave the boxing champion the rank of Cabinet secretary. Pacquiao takes over the National Anti-Poverty Commission from Lope Santos III, who had led its secretariat since 2023.
His new post inside the Manny Pacquiao anti-poverty commission carries a coordinating mandate, not control of a single welfare programme. As NAPC lead convenor, he will run daily operations, align agencies and engage the 14 basic sectors the commission serves. Republic Act 8425, the Social Reform and Poverty Alleviation Act, created the body in 1998 and named the president as its chair. Marcos recently moved the commission from the Department of Social Welfare to the Office of the President through Executive Order 123, a shift that raised its standing before Pacquiao arrived. The post also sits apart from that of Larry Gadon, the presidential adviser on poverty alleviation.
Numbers behind the appointment
His Marcos cabinet appointment arrives as the country’s poverty indicators record steady improvement. Government data put the Philippines’ poverty rate in 2025 at 9.7 percent of the population, down from 15.5 percent in 2023. That lower share still represents about 11.08 million Filipinos living below the poverty line. Households in the poorest brackets gained the most. First decile incomes rose 23.8 percent, while second decile incomes climbed 22.7 percent over the same window.
The Philippine Statistics Authority also recorded declines in family poverty across all 18 regions between 2023 and 2025. Family poverty incidence now sits at its lowest level since the current series began. The Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role begins with those indicators already moving in the government’s favour.
Inside the Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role
A fixed deadline shapes the Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role. Marcos has set a single-digit national poverty rate of 8 to 9 percent by 2028, and the latest data leaves the government within about one percentage point of that goal. Reaching it depends on programmes that pair job creation with skills investment, social protection and better public services. Pacquiao will monitor those programmes, recommend policy measures and coordinate how resources move across agencies.
Convergence defines the job more than any single benefit scheme. His office pulls separate efforts into one direction and reports where they fall short. The Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role will be measured in the national figures, not in speeches.
From the streets to the commission
Pacquiao ties the role to hardship he knew long before boxing made him rich. He grew up selling goods on the streets of General Santos City, worked as a ship stowaway, and fought for about two dollars a bout as a boy. “I came from poverty. I experienced sleeping on cardboard on the streets, drinking only water, having nothing to eat,” he said in a statement.
Estimates of Manny Pacquiao’s net worth vary, and Sports Illustrated placed his fortune at 220 million dollars last year. He topped Forbes’ list of the world’s highest-paid athletes in 2012 and 2015. Outside politics, he has funded housing for poor Filipinos and handed cash to long queues of supporters after major fights.
The appointment gives the fighter his first Cabinet position after 12 years in Congress and the Senate. It follows his 2025 induction into the International Boxing Hall of Fame as the only eight-division world champion in the sport’s history. Pacquiao has yet to set out a detailed plan for the commission.
- HM
Elie Saab H&M Collection Lands October 22 With Prices Starting at $39.99
The Elie Saab H&M collection does something simple. It takes the glamour usually seen on award-show stages and puts it on a rack most people can afford. Saab has spent decades dressing famous faces. Starting October 22, his designs reach the high street at high-street prices. That gap, couture on one end and a shopping-mall budget on the other, is the whole point.
What the Elie Saab H&M collection includes
The Elie Saab H&M collection runs to 54 pieces. It covers womenswear and menswear, with accessories and footwear rounding out the range. You get sharp tailoring and the fine embellishments that made Saab’s name. Think eveningwear you can pull on for a party, not a couture fitting.
Ann-Sofie Johansson, H&M’s creative advisor and head of design for womenswear, worked closely with Saab’s team. She wants shoppers to feel they are getting the real thing. In her words, it should never be a poorer version of something. Johansson calls the collection powerful and admits she leans toward the menswear herself.
Fit sat at the center of the work. Johansson says the fit is one of the most important parts of the house, and she believes a good fit changes how you carry yourself. The team spent more than a year on the collection to keep each piece close to what she calls the Elie Saab spirit. That meant timeless shapes over passing trends.
- Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang told CBS News on Sept. 18 that there is a “0% chance” AI ends the world by 2030 and called researchers’ warnings “doomsday narratives.”
- The same day, four paying chatbot subscribers filed an antitrust suit against Anthropic, OpenAI, Google and SpaceX AI over an alleged pact to slow AI development.
- The suit centers on a Sept. 12 essay by Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei and the public endorsements it drew from Sam Altman, Elon Musk and Demis Hassabis.
- Nvidia is paying about $12.9 billion for Hugging Face, the platform OpenAI test agents breached in July, an event Amodei cited for changing his position.
- ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE
Elie Saab H&M prices and release date
Here is what most people want to know. The Elie Saab H&M prices start at $39.99 for a choker necklace and reach $429 for a leather jacket. Everything in between sits within a normal high-street range, which is the promise of the whole project.
The Elie Saab H&M release date is October 22. It drops online and in select H&M stores on the same day. Shoppers across the Gulf can find it in stores in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Egypt. The Elie Saab H&M collection reaches this region on day one, not weeks later.
For fans here, that matters. Saab is Lebanese, and his name carries weight across the Middle East. Bringing the line to Gulf shelves puts his work in front of the audience that has followed him the longest. The campaign features Egyptian-Moroccan model Imaan Hammam, shot on the streets of Paris.
Why Elie Saab said yes
Saab has never done a fashion collaboration quite like this one. Turning couture signatures into mass-market clothing is new ground for the house. So why now?
CEO Elie Saab Jr. says the timing lined up with the brand’s growth. The company has been expanding across regions and building out its Elie Saab ready-to-wear line to match. He described the moment as the right one, with the label moving from occasionwear toward a broader lifestyle offer. The Elie Saab H&M collaboration gave that vision a much larger audience.
He also pointed to H&M’s record with names like Stella McCartney, Giambattista Valli and Lanvin. That history gave his team confidence. They felt, in his words, they were in safe hands. The Elie Saab ready-to-wear push and the H&M deal now work toward the same goal, reaching people who admire the label but never expected to own a piece.
A designer known for red carpet gowns
Long before this deal, Saab built his reputation on Elie Saab red carpet gowns. He founded his house in Beirut in 1982 and made his first mark with bridalwear and eveningwear. In 2003, he became one of the first non-French designers admitted to France’s Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture, the body that governs official haute couture.
Since then, his gowns have appeared on stars like Kate Winslet, Céline Dion and Jennifer Lopez. Catherine, Princess of Wales, has worn his designs too. A single couture piece can run into five figures, which keeps it out of most closets.
That is what makes the Elie Saab H&M collection different. It hands you the look and feel of that world at a price you can plan around. October 22 is the day to watch.
Global Village Season 31 opening date: what Dubai visitors should know
- US Open
What the US Open women’s final means for Rybakina and Sabalenka
The US Open women’s final on Saturday will settle a trophy but not a ranking. Elena Rybakina and Aryna Sabalenka walk onto Arthur Ashe Stadium at 4 p.m. ET as the top two players in the world, and the order between them has already been fixed by the WTA rankings. Rybakina becomes No. 1 on […]
- Manny Pacquiao
Pacquiao replaces Lope Santos III and will coordinate poverty programmes across national agencies
The Manny Pacquiao poverty reduction role places the former senator at the head of the agency that coordinates anti-poverty policy across the Philippine government. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. administered his oath at Malacañang and gave the boxing champion the rank of Cabinet secretary. Pacquiao takes over the National Anti-Poverty Commission from Lope Santos III, who […]
- HM
Elie Saab H&M Collection Lands October 22 With Prices Starting at $39.99
The Elie Saab H&M collection does something simple. It takes the glamour usually seen on award-show stages and puts it on a rack most people can afford. Saab has spent decades dressing famous faces. Starting October 22, his designs reach the high street at high-street prices. That gap, couture on one end and a shopping-mall […]
- Global Village Dubai
Global Village Season 31 opening date: what Dubai visitors should know
Dubai’s Global Village Season 31 opening date has not been confirmed, though the park is expected to return in October 2026. Season 30 closed on May 31, 2026, starting the annual summer break. Global Village usually reopens in mid-October, once the worst of the heat eases. Season 31 will bring back cultural pavilions, food stalls, […]
How the 6G band in the UAE could triple network capacity on existing towers
The case for the 6G band in the UAE rests on a small number: two to five percent. That is
- By Rami Al-Saadi
Eagle Hills eyes 2027 construction start on $20 billion Maldives project
For thousands of Maldivian families, a $20 billion Maldives project now stands between where they live today and a new
- By Amira Khalil