News

Yango Group Unveils Yasmina AI-Enhanced Smart Speakers For UAE

The Mini and Midi-sized models feature a bilingual AI assistant with personalized interactions and smart home integration.

Published

2 years ago

August 26, 2024

Nour Nasir

Yango

Yango Group has just introduced two new AI-enhanced smart speakers in the UAE. The Yasmina Midi and Yasmina Mini come equipped with a bilingual AI assistant with conversational skills in both Khaleeji Arabic and English, making interactions feel natural and culturally relevant.

Powered by Yango Group’s proprietary large language model (LLM), Yasmina can conduct lifelike conversations and even add a touch of humor with local jokes. The speakers’ features extend beyond basic conversation and can recognize up to four different family members by their voices and tailor content according to each individual’s preferences. By remembering users’ likes and dislikes, Yasmina can suggest music and other content based on personal tastes.

In addition, Yasmina can also display information such as the time and weather, while also conveying emotions through an LED screen. The dynamic lighting adjusts to match the ambiance of the music or the nature of the interaction.

Finally, for religious users, Yasmina can also recite surahs from the Quran, play Adhans, and provide the Hijri calendar date. Both speakers also offer prayer times for any global location.

Key Features Of Yasmina Smart Speakers

The Yasmina Midi speaker is designed for spaces up to 300 square feet, featuring three speakers, including a subwoofer and two tweeters, for a powerful, expansive sound. The more compact Yasmina Mini is ideal for smaller rooms up to 200 square feet, offering clear, balanced audio.

Also Read: Tribit StormBox Pro Portable Speaker Review

Both models prioritize privacy with a mute button that disconnects the microphones, preventing Yasmina from listening or responding to voice commands when activated. The speakers also function as smart home hubs, enabling users to control their environment using voice commands. Yasmina Midi includes Zigbee and Wi-Fi capabilities, while the Yasmina Mini connects to smart home systems via Wi-Fi.

Availability & Special Offers

Yasmina Midi and Yasmina Mini can be purchased from various retailers and online platforms across the UAE, including Virgin Megastore, Jumbo Electronics, Sharaf DG, and noon.com. The Yasmina Midi is priced at AED 449, and the Yasmina Mini is AED 279.

To enhance the smart speaker experience, Yango Group is also offering a 90-day free trial of Yango Play. With an active subscription, Yasmina can recommend and play content tailored to each family member’s preferences, making the listening experience more personalized.

Related Topics:Artificial Intelligence Yango Yasmina

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Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon

Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.

Published

2 weeks ago

August 27, 2026

Dana Saadeh

visa's return to syria starts with a test and a bank in lebanon

Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.

The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.

Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc

— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026

“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.

Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.

Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget

The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.

Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.