Kazi Najib Ashraf: East calling the west

The title of my blog is “Future Ready” and I have been publishing it now for well over three years. There was a lull in the beginning of 2019, but then I brought it back by popular demand of local and regional readers who are always in search of the most relevant market news in mobile trading and changing trends in technology. Both Facebook and LinkedIn are the mediums where I share up-to-date information pertaining to the Middle East Mobile Market that regularly transgresses into the African and Subcontinental regions as well. It would have been nice to have a website monitoring the various ups and downs of the mobile trade with regular news and information like that of a stock market.

The trades and capital involved have called for a vehicle to justify this effort, as the coming timelines bring forth the changing face of this business altogether. DAFZA has already played a pivotal role in the mobile trade and will continue to do so as long as business flows through the Middle East. There’s nothing like DAFZA that facilitates an infrastructure to provide the same ease of business and the concentration of traders across boundaries. However, the changing face of these business dynamics calls for new ideas and strategies.

Brand positioning

Being a region demanding a high ASP in major markets, the brands discusses are Apple and Samsung. There is no requirement and place for other brands to play in this foray. Huawei had tried hard but at the same time brought in mega restrictions in terms of activations, and it never created a name in the trading arena (the same for its minor side kick, Honor). A clarification is called for here: trading in general terms means a brand that has a fluid acceptance across regions and is freely available (such as Apple and Samsung). This is in contrast to brands that might have a demand in certain markets or territories and are hard to move in others (like Nokia or Xiaomi), or are restricted by the manufacturer through activation control (Huawei).

There are no operator handset subsidies available in the Middle East and North Africa, so the game resides within the retail market in the independent and organized channels, which are always hungry for better pricing. This is what drives the demand for grey.