A third of participants express optimism for trading in 2012 at first ‘Dubai CEO Forum’

Dubai Multi Commodities Centre Authority, the Free Zone authority for the Jumeirah Lakes Towers Free Zone (JLT), and Organisation Solutions, a leading organisation transformation and leadership consultancy, recently hosted the first Dubai CEO Forum. The forum, which brought together 50 CEOs and Managing Directors from a range of commodity and non-commodity companies based in JLT, explored the opportunities and challenges to finding growth in the emerging markets through dynamic debate and discussion.   

The forum took place on Thursday 8 December 2011 at the Almas Tower and featured a panel of senior business leaders comprising; Yogesh Mehta, Managing Director, Petrochem; Andrew Croft, General Manager UAE, Talent 2; Dennis McGettigan, General Manager, Bonnington Hotel and; Malcolm Wall Morris, Chief Executive Officer, DMCC.  

During the interactive session, both panellists and attendees expressed their views on the year ahead and shared the various approaches that they have taken to not only survive, but thrive, in challenging market conditions. Concerns about the volatile macro-economic and geo-political climate remained a key topic of discussion with an informal show of hands revealing that participants were equally divided in their views about 2012. One third expected 2012 to be better than 2011, one third the same and one third worse. 

Commenting on the first Dubai CEO Forum, Malcolm Wall Morris, Chief Executive Officer, DMCC, said: “We launched the Dubai CEO Forum with Organisation Solutions to give our JLT Free Zone clients the opportunity to share experiences and develop networks. Building businesses in emerging markets is central to all our clients’ ambitions and the Forum drew out many consistent themes. The cautiously optimistic expectations for growth in 2012 suggest that many companies based in Dubai are still able to exploit current conditions and find growth in developing economies. This correlates with the strong interest we are seeing in the DMCC from companies from around the world looking to register businesses and access regional markets.” 

Dr Alison Eyring, CEO, Organisation Solutions and the forum’s moderator commented: “The forum explored the main challenges affecting companies and here, as in other emerging markets, attracting and developing talent as well as access to growth capital and the rising cost of finance were key concerns. Panel experts were able to offer valuable insights and anecdotes from speakers from the floor allowed participants to learn from each other’s experiences. With unanimous support for this first event, we look forward to hosting further Dubai CEO Forums in the New Year.”