The region’s leading e-commerce and retail industry experts gathered in Dubai on Monday for the inaugural edition of the Arab E-Commerce Summit. The one-day Summit, which is taking place at the Shangri-La Hotel in Dubai, seeks to address some of the biggest challenges facing the regional e-commerce industry and attempts to bring together various segments of the e-commerce industry on one platform in order to further give impetus to the growth of this rapidly advancing industry.
Addressing the elite gathering of e-commerce professionals and other senior level people connected to the retail industry, in his keynote address, Abdulaziz Al Hammadi, Head of Marketing and Corporate Communications, DAFZA, highlighted the crucial role that Free Zones are playing for the promotion and propagation of e-commerce in the Arab World. He said: “Free zones are growing in significance as key enablers of the region’s thriving e-commerce sector. They facilitate the seamless operations of global enterprises, provide advanced infrastructure and services, and connect their hosted companies with the local business communities. Given the highly strategic role of free zones not only for the sustained growth of e-commerce but for the economic progress of the region overall, the Arab E-Commerce Summit is an ideal platform for discussing how our facilities fit within the Arab World’s e-commerce ambitions.”
During the summit, Al Hammadi will lead a team to familiarize e-commerce companies with DAFZA and explain how the Middle East’s leading freezone can help their sector achieve rapid growth. DAFZA will also host a lunch to interact with the region’s top e-commerce players.
Idriss Al Rifai, CEO, Fetchr highlighted the innovations taking place in the field of e-commerce delivery mechanisms and, with the help of real world examples, explained the extreme importance of having a good delivery partner for a successful e-commerce setup.
Zak Nasser, Product Manager at Dubizzle talked about the probable upcoming e-commerce disruption and a framework that aids long-term strategy in a rapidly transforming world. On another note, e-commerce expert David Fuller, in his presentation title ‘No More Excuses’, highlighted the kind of excuses that people make to justify non-performance of their e-commerce venture and why it’s about time that we should move beyond those excuses.
Some of the areas that the Summit touches upon, include online payments, e-commerce security, free zones and e-commerce, delivery mechanisms etc. The 2017 edition of the Summit is being supported by Dubai Airport Free Zone as Exclusive Free Zone Partner, ShoeBeDoo as Gold Partner and AWOK.com as Supporting Partner.