The Sixth Digital Consumer Channel (DCC) MEA 2010 successfully brought together over 500 participants from 63 vendors and 130 retail outlets across 15 countries in the Middle East & North Africa region. The event saw the scheduling of more than 1200 one-on-one meetings between key decision makers.
Farouk Hemraj, CEO of DISTREE Events, said, "This year we have received overwhelming support from our participants in terms of quality meetings. As the event becomes one of the 'must attend' events in the region, we have noticed that the retail chains like Carrefour and Virgin Megastores are sending more than one key representative, giving vendors better access to wider markets in the region."
Shahid N. Khan, VP Electronics Group – X-cite, Yusuf Alghanim & Sons, Kuwait, said, "This is the first time I have attended DCC MEA. This event gave me the opportunity to meet and spend quality time with the vendors, discussing business away from the distractions of day to day business. I think events like these are very useful to help us keep abreast of new technologies, network with our peers across the region and access new initiatives in our region."
DCC MEA closed with its Retail Academy workshop sessions, where delegates had access to some of the region's leading retail analysts and consultants speaking on key issues including refurbishing and recycling, managing cash flow and vendor loyalty among other topics.
"This event gets better every year," said Amr Sheira, CEO of CompuMe, Egypt. "It has now become the focus of every vendor in the retail sector as well as key retailers. The event carries a lot of weight in the industry. Going beyond meetings and business deals, the talks and workshops give us an insight into future trends like sustainability. As part of the industry, it is important for technology companies and retail sector to embrace issues like refurbishing and recycling hardware, ensuring that it preserves our resources while creating new revenue streams for our businesses."
"DCC MEA is serving its role in bringing vendors and retailers together very effectively," added Hadi Chelala, GM – Lebanon, KSA at Virgin Megastores. "The event has created a platform that helps to create synergy, understand the key challenges that the sector faces and how we can tackle these effectively. I find the speakers and topics both informative and interactive. This year's event also had a good selection of vendors and distributors."
"Vendors too are adding DCC MEA to their marketing strategy since it gives them the opportunity to meet key retailers from across the region under one roof," Hemraj added.
"When we participated in DCC MEA last year, we realised the importance of this event and what it means to our strategy for our brand and our products," explained Youssef El-Arif, National Account Manager-MEA, Belkin. "It gave us the opportunity to meet key decision makers across the region, share new ideas, and of course network with our peers. This year, it is even bigger and we were able to consolidate our presence in the region."
First time vendor Lenovo thought the event was a great platform to meet the right retailers for their business. Anjum Qadiri, Marketing Manager, Lenovo MEEP, added, "We found DCC MEA to be an excellent platform for networking and introducing complete line up of Lenovo Idea range of products to the decision makers from the entire region's retail industry .The calibre of attendees was outstanding which facilitated highly productive decisions. We are confident that this event will continue to provide excellent opportunities for interaction amongst key players in the retail industry."
Intel too participated in DCC MEA for the first time. Nassir Nauthoa, GM for Gulf countries at Intel said, "As a B2B event, it is a great platform to meet potential partners from across the region, resulting in productive meetings with retailers and other potential partners."
Cisco's Regional Manager-MEA for Consumer Business Group, Amanulla Khan, said: "We had three clear strategies for this event – re-emphasise our consumer strategy, showcase our product innovation and strengthen our retail partner relationships. We were able to achieve all three. DCC MEA allowed us to discuss business with key partners in some key focus areas like Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and Egypt where we successfully established the initial dialogue with potential partners. The event also gave us the feedback we needed to go forward and strengthen our existing and new partnerships."
This year's DCC MEA introduced the Hospitality Zone. This new area located on the second floor of Le Meridien Al Aqah allowed vendors to showcase the latest additions to their product portfolio in a dedicated space. The Hospitality Zone rooms also doubled as private meeting rooms for these key vendors.
Ghassan El Hout, Sales Manager-Entertainment & Devices with Microsoft, one of the vendors in the Hospitality Zone, said, "This event is a great platform to meet the channel from all over the region in one place, under one roof. The organisation of the event has been great. The DISTREE team are always on top of things. The event gets stronger every year."
