Governments and companies are making the right stands against ongoing economic changes as much as they possibly can. However, inflation, in some ways, and currency fluctuation created opportunities for international investors to invest in Egypt’s residential, commercial, and industrial properties, said Alexander Edwards, the Exhibition Director of Cityscape Egypt.
Daily News Egypt sat down with Edwards to learn more about the upcoming edition of Cityscape Egypt.
How many companies will participate or sponsor the Cityscape Egypt exhibition?
Cityscape Egypt is taking place in September, and we are hoping to increase the number of exhibitors this year, we are looking forward to having approximately between 80 and up to 100 companies. As for the sponsors we are still getting in touch with all the sponsors from our side, we are looking forward to having new sponsors that could help us with some features ideas within the event itself so this year may be different from what it has been in the previous years.
As you know, there are a lot of economic changes that the world is currently facing, will this affect organizing the exhibition? What are your alternative plans to face these challenges?
Of course, inflation is not just in Egypt, it’s happening across the world and globally at the moment, so companies and governments are making the right stands against those economic changes as much as they possibly can. However, inflation in some ways and currency fluctuation is a great opportunity for international investors to invest in the country whether it’s residential, commercial, and industrial properties. There are great challenges over there, with what’s going on between Ukraine and Russia is unfortunately a very sad phase. But from our side of things, we don’t see that much of an impact on our exhibitions.
What is new in the Cityscape Egypt 2022 exhibition?
That’s the question everyone wants to ask; we have got some really exciting things planned for Cityscape Egypt 2022 in September. I am not going to tell you the details yet, but you will expect to see some new activities in the exhibition this year and also in our marketing campaigns, there are going to be a lot of different things this year but we will leave it as a surprise.
What are your expectations about the number of attendees this year and the number of the companies that will participate in this edition?
Our expectations as a company and as organizers are always extremely high, the increase in the amount of exhibitors always leads to an increase in the amount of visitors that come to the event. We would like to see more exhibitors as well as of course supporting our foundation and those exhibitors that have been established with us for the past 10 years in Cityscape Egypt. We want to support new developers coming in but in the right way, we would like to work more closely with local governments to really support their initiatives and we will be having features of this year’s show to support not just developers but also those visitors and giving them another reason to come visit the show, and that’s the investment in real estate, but we want to give them other reasons to come and believe that the market is now right, established and mature enough to be able to offer maybe educational seminars.
How many deals were reached in Cityscape last year? What is your expectation for this edition?
It’s very difficult for us to get the amount of revenues that was generated at Cityscape 2021, all you could look at is companies like Coldwell Banker, one of the regional most established brokerages globally, and you see the numbers they are producing at the exhibition, probably reaching billions of Egyptian pounds, that is a small example of how much revenues are generated. The question we ask our customers is, what’s new for this year, what type of projects you’re showing, what’s your price range and that allows us to tailor our marketing campaigns to those particular types of visitors and drive those visitors into our exhibitions and then understand our expectations, we want to be better each and every year and so far we’ve managed that, 2022 will be no different and will be better than 2021.
In light of Covid-19, what are the measurements and precautions that will be adopted during this year’s edition?
Last two years, we had something called Informa Allsecure, which is a set of guidelines that is settled by us as a company of what we want to see, we had our exhibitions in 2020 and 2021 and we are still working with local governments and venues to make sure we have the right precautions in place at that particular time, I don’t want to say what are the precautions are right now, because they might change by September. But be sure, if precautions are needed, we will be able to implement them like we have done over the last 2 years.
What are the major and hot topics that will be discussed in the new edition?
That is a very good question, what we would like to introduce more international visitors into Cityscape Egypt which is a great opportunity for that, as for hot topics, that what was being discussed today In the business breakfast and we’ve got another meeting later on today to discuss those hot topics and see how we take our event forward for 2022, be assured that you’ll be the first one to hear it out.
Are there any other countries that will be invited to participate in this year’s edition? How do you promote Cityscape abroad?
We’ve always had international participations at Cityscape Egypt, there’s never been a large participation, this year I would like to bring some more international companies into the show, I’m speaking to government institutions in Turkey at the moment, hoping to bring Turkey to Cityscape Egypt next year, and having conversations with developers from Cyprus as well, so yes there is an opportunity for us to bring more international companies to Cityscape Egypt, it’s a tough task but we will manage it.
Do you think you can merge between the different conferences that are held in GCC and in Egypt, in order to exchange expertise and culture?
In all our Cityscapes, every country has different challenges when it comes to the real estate industry and they need different answers, and different content. What we are looking at is actually bringing in international speakers into the Cityscape Egypt conference this year, there are different voices with different experiences, so yes we are looking into introducing international speakers at the conference.
