Following the opening of a directly managed, Middle East sales office in Dubai, The Economist Group, the leading global media company, has appointed sales representatives in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Palestine for all advertising and sponsorship sales. This strategic move is part of a worldwide initiative that has restructured The Economist Group along regional lines to bring the company and its products closer to customers and markets.
Gray Business Communications (GBC), headquartered in Dubai will be responsible for Saudi Arabia, while their Riyadh-based affiliate, GBC KSA extends their geographic reach to also take on responsibility for Egypt, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan and Palestine. This new regional agreement follows the successful relationship between GBC and The Economist Group signed in 2006 which set a foundation for The Economist Group establishing their directly staffed office in Dubai Media City in 2008.
David Taylor-Evans, The Economist Group’s Managing Director, Middle East and Africa said, “This appointment underlines our commitment to Saudi Arabia and the Levant. We look forward to continuing our work with GBC, a partner who understands our needs in order to help our growth, both in terms of readership, advertising and other group activities. “
Barry Gray, CEO of GBC stated “We are pleased to re-establish our relationship with The Economist Group and to see their confidence in our regional capability. Extending our commercial relationship to other parts of the Arab world is an important new move for GBC following our recent divestment of our established publishing and conferencing business in early 2008. Over the past several years we have built a strong relationship with The Economist Group which I am very pleased to see extended,” he said.
Rabih El-Amine, Managing Director of GBC KSA, said: “We are proud to become more closely involved with The Economist Group in Saudi Arabia and to extend our Economist operations to include the Levant and Egypt. As a leading publishing and media company in the kingdom, we understand The Economist’s business direction and priorities, which will form the basis for the success of this relationship,”
El-Amine said GBC KSA, a licensee of the Gray Business Communications’ parent company with offices in Riyadh and Beirut, will play an active role in supporting The Economist Group’s growth across the region. “We will leverage the growing readership and enormous respect enjoyed by The Economist and build on the group’s increasing activities in the region. Our strength comes from our regional presence and deep understanding of the local culture and commercial structure,” he said.
As and official representative of The Economist Group, GBC will be selling advertising in The Economist weekly newspaper, Intelligent Life quarterly magazine, The World In annual publication of predictions, as well as promoting conference and research white papers sponsorship.
