As the Gulf races to build one of the world’s most ambitious AI ecosystems, Dubai has turned to a quieter gap: the media professionals expected to explain it to the public. 

by Zaara Abbas, Digital Media Reports at Tech Revolt

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On 24 June 2026, the Dubai Centre for Artificial Intelligence, an initiative overseen by the Dubai Future Foundation, held an event called ‘AI Economy for Media Professionals 2026,’ in collaboration with Dubai Media Academy, part of Dubai Media Incorporated. The gathering of journalists, editors, and decision-makers is part of Dubai’s aggressively engineered AI adoption strategy.  

The timing is not incidental either. With Dubai having one of the most thorough AI adoption strategies in the world, the immediate question becomes: who is translating it for the public? 

Dubai’s AI ambitions demand an informed media ecosystem 

The Dubai Centre for Artificial intelligence has delivered more than 108,000 hours of support to government bodies building AI applications, and an Agentic AI transformation program approved by Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum aims to reach 295,000 companies, develop 100 specialized AI assistants within two years and seed 50 Agentic AI firms. Saeed Al Falasi, Executive Director of the Dubai Centre for Artificial Intelligence, framed the event plainly.

“This event reflects the Centre’s commitment to supporting media professionals and empowering them to cover the specialised topic of AI economy, and develop content that informs the public. DCAI is also keen on equipping them with knowledge of the AI tools in the media profession, to enhance a new level of content creation in the media.” 

Adding 

“Our mission at DCAI is to ensure that AI, and every technological breakthrough, is used with the people of Dubai as its final beneficiary, improving the quality of their lives and enhancing government services for them. Media has a key role to augment and extend our mission.” 

The framing is significant as it casts media not as a passive observer of Dubai’s AI strategy, rather as a delivery mechanism for it. If residents do not understand what the AI economy means for their jobs and public services, the strategy’s reach is inherently limited. Coverage quality, therefore, is a strategic concern rather than a soft one. 

A workforce under transformation needs a media that can keep up 

Currently, the UAE leads the world in AI hiring growth. With up to 48 percent in 2024 to 2025, surveys tracked by Nadia Global show roughly 48 percent of UAE companies expect to increase hiring in 2026. A Korn Ferry report drawing on leaders across more than 100 GCC organizations calls AI a defining force in regional transformation. Yet it also finds a structural gap. In around 60 percent of cases accountability for AI sits with CIOs or IT leaders, while HR is almost absent at 3 percent, despite workforce impact being among AI’s most immediate consequences. If senior leadership is still catching up to AI’s implications for people and roles, newsrooms face an analogous challenge, since covering AI as an economic force demands a fluency most journalism training was never built to provide. 

That is the terrain the Centre and Dubai Media Academy are addressing together. Muna Bu Samra, Director of Dubai Media Academy, made the stakes plain. 

“We at Dubai Media Academy believe that effective media partnerships are essential for advancing the media sector and providing national talents with the requisite knowledge and tools needed to keep pace with rapid digital transformations. This also includes the responsible and efficient use of AI technologies, which will in turn contribute to enhancing the competitiveness of media professionals and elevating the standards of their professional performance.” 

From frameworks to a formal award 

The sessions covered the Centre’s economic initiatives, including the AI Government Use Cases Bank, the AI Baseline study, the Dubai AI Seal, and a new study on AI’s impact on Dubai’s workforce and demography. The Seal, developed during Dubai AI Week to classify and endorse trusted AI providers, is exactly the kind of framework that benefits from contextual reporting. The new AI Economy Media Award formalizes the ambition and is an institutional signal that quality coverage of the AI economy will be officially recognized. 

Why this model could travel 

What Dubai is attempting is not unprecedented, but it is unusually systematic. Governments have long partnered with media in specialized cases such as financial or health journalism. Applying that model to the AI economy acknowledges that the technology now carries enough policy and market weight to warrant dedicated journalistic infrastructure. Sheikh Hamdan has said that AI is driving economic opportunities and reinforcing Dubai’s position as a global hub for the digital economy. If that transformation is to be meaningfully accountable to residents and investors, a capable media ecosystem is not optional, rather becomes a part of it’s architecture. The event suggests Dubai understands that the story of its AI ambitions is only as credible as the journalists equipped to tell it.

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