(Photo courtesy of Samsung Egypt)
What is Samsung’s market share with respect to the Home Appliance market in Egypt? How do you intend to maximise market share?
Samsung is grabbing market share with a combination of technological innovation and stylish design. Part of our strategy is offering high-end products in home appliances by launching a range of re-defining products in the Egyptian market. As one of the fastest-growing appliance brands, we are targeting to be the largest appliance brand in 3 years. We entered the home appliances market in 2011 and look how much far we have reached compared to our competitors with 30 years experience. We are in the top five brands of washing machines, refrigerators and second in top loading ones. The reason for this fast improvement is that Samsung creates innovative appliances through understanding human behaviour and developing new ways to make everyday life extraordinary. The company also studies consumers’ lifestyle patterns in its R&D facilities and replica homes. Samsung invested $13.6bn in R&D in 2013. It is the combination of expert collaboration and real life insights that helps Samsung to continue to innovate.
Globally, Samsung was no.1 in global market share for refrigerators in 2013, and it is targeting $18bn in sales by 2015 in the home appliance market worldwide.
Are all Samsung’s products imported from the company’s plants abroad or are some locally assembled in Egypt? Which companies does Samsung cooperate with to complete the assembling process?
Samsung invested EGP 1.8bn in the Beni Suef plant, which highlights the key strategic market that Egypt has become. This is the first factory established by Samsung in the MENA region, with the production line already manufacturing TVs and computer monitors as the first phase of the factory’s development. In the meantime, we are importing home appliance products from the Far East region. Our high-end products are imported from Korea while medium and low-end ones are made in Thailand.
Does Samsung export any devices that are assembled or manufactured in Egypt to African countries?
The Beni Suef factory’s operations started in July 2013 are expected to contribute greatly to the development of the Egyptian economy, aiming to position Egypt as the export hub for Samsung’s products to the entire region. Samsung started exporting locally manufactured computer monitors to a number of European countries. Our ambitious expansion plan will include exporting the plant’s ‘Made in Egypt’ monitors to countries in Asia and Africa as well.
Does Samsung intend to establish a plant in the Egyptian market for home appliance products? When? What are the estimated investments for this approach?
We believe that Egypt offers an investment climate in which Samsung can grow, especially since it has excellent geographical factors and great resources. If all conditions are met such as market requirements, Samsung will expand to produce different cutting edge products and thousands of jobs will be created.
Are there any obstacles Samsung has previously faced or is currently facing? Are there any requests to the Egyptian government to help overcome these obstacles?
Egypt is considered a centre for diverse business opportunities across a broad range of industry sectors which is why the country always welcome and encourage foreign investment. Egypt’s Ministry of Investment is leveraging local and regional resources, which will further enhance the region’s technological and investments growth and be reflected positively in the country’s economic growth.
