Key Dates

Entry deadline – 30th August
Judging – September
Awards Presentation – tbc

Entry Eligibility

Entrants must hold a valid trade license in the UAE and have been trading for 2 years, have a turnover of AED 250 million or less and less than 250 employees*. Entries will not be accepted from branches of international subsidiaries.

Award Categories

Business Awards

Business of the Year

This award is designed to identify the UAE-based Business that can show evidence of maintaining consistent growth and strong financial performance. The Winner will have demonstrated how it is delivering its company vision and mission. Entrants for this award must show how they have been successful in delivering key goals, competitor advantage, growth and innovation. Judges will also look for excellent customer service, future growth plan, how the business is developing its employees and the leadership of the business.

Turnover 250m aed or less
No. of Employees -250 or less

Small Business of the Year

This award is designed to identify the UAE-based Business that can show evidence of maintaining consistent growth and strong financial performance. The Winner will have demonstrated how it is delivering its company vision and mission. Entrants for this award must show how they have been successful in delivering key goals, competitor advantage, growth and innovation. Judges will also look for excellent customer service, future growth plan, how the business is developing its employees and the leadership of the business.

Turnover 50m aed or less
No. of Employees -250 or less

Emirati Business of the Year

This award is designed to identify the Emirati-owned and UAE-based Business that can show evidence of maintaining consistent growth and strong financial performance. The Winner will have demonstrated how it is delivering its company vision and mission. Entrants for this award must show how they have been successful in delivering key goals, competitor advantage, growth and innovation. Judges will also look for excellent customer service, future growth plan, how the business is developing its employees and the leadership of the business.

Turnover 250m aed or less
No. of Employees -250 or less

Online Business of the Year

Open to any UAE business trading online, this award will go to the candidate that can best demonstrate consistent growth and strong financial performance from e-commerce. Judges will look for evidence of concept and product development, exceptional implementation, customer engagement & functionality and innovation. Entrants for this award must show how they have been successful in delivering key goals, competitor advantage, growth and innovation. Judges will also look for excellent customer service, future growth plan, how the business is developing its employees and the leadership of the business.

Start-up Business of the Year

This award is designed to identify the UAE-based Start-up Business that can show evidence of how the business has put in place the foundations and strong plan for future growth. The Winner will have demonstrated how it has created and is delivering its company vision and mission. Examples of how the business concept, services and products have been developed must be demonstrated and how the business has communicated with its customer base.

Businesses must have been trading for less than 2 years to enter this category.

Individual Awards

Entrepreneur of the Year

The Entrepreneur of the Year Award will recognise the most inspiring, dynamic and driven leader. Entrants must show how they have overcome challenges to grow their successful business and how they have achieved this through passion, commitment, innovation, market knowledge, innovation and inspiring and motivating their Team.

Business Leader of the Year

The Business Leader of the Year Award recognises the outstanding leadership of SMEs in the UAE. The Judges will look for the Leader who can demonstrate examples of excellent business leadership in empowering his/her employees, leadership approach, a successful existing and future growth plan and how his/her successful leadership has had a direct result on the success of their business.

Innovation, Business Initiatives & Product Development Awards

Sustainable Initiative of the Year

This award will go to the organisation that can best demonstrate the successful adoption of a sustainable initiative. Entrants will need to provide examples of policies or projects that positively impact on society, the environment and the economy. Judges will look for evidence of how a sustainable initiative has improved one or more of the following areas; customer perception, staff engagement, commercial performance and competitiveness.

Customer Focus of the Year

This important Award recognises organisations that truly have the customer at the centre of their business - the winning business for this Category will show how they have built their business plan with their customers at the core, in terms of developing new services/products and revenue streams according to their customers' needs. The Judges will look for exemplary customer service examples and outstanding communication with customers.

Business Innovation of the Year

This Award recognises innovations in any part of the business. The submitted innovation could be a product, service, project or initiative in any department, e.g. customer service, marketing, PR, technology implementation, new product concepts. Entrants must be able to show evidence of how the innovation has impacted the business and created competitive advantage in their field.

People & Culture of the Year

This Award will go to the organisation that can best demonstrate how the business has created a positive working environment and invested in developing its people. The Entrant for this Award must be able to show how it focuses on motivating its Team, engaging its Team in the company's values and how this has impacted the business' commercial performance and competitive advantage.

For information please visit: http://sme.ameinfo.com/awards/

For awards enquiries and event partnership opportunities please email Janice Menezes, for all sponsorship enquiries please email Becky Crayman.