Egypt The Future: Cairo’s big event draws global players’ interest

Major UAE firms are set to attend Egypt the Future summit.

Speakers scheduled for the Egypt The Future summit include a range of UAE business chiefs from top international firms.

They include: Ahmad Julfar, the chief executive of Etisalat Group; Arif Naqvi, the founder and group chief executive of the private equity firm Abraaj; Sultan Bin Sulayem, the chairman of DP World; Shayne Nelson, the chief executive of the lender Emirates NBD; and Mohammed Alabbar, the chairman of Emaar Properties.

The Minister of State, Sultan Al Jaber, is also expected to speak alongside prominent Egyptian businessmen including Naguib Sawiris of Orascom Telecom and Ahmed Heikal, the chairman and founder of Qalaa Holdings, an investment company focused on Africa and the Middle East.

One-on-one meetings between the Egyptian president Abdel Fattah El Sisi, relevant ministers and major investors are scheduled to take place alongside official summit programming.

About 1,000 Saudi and 150 Lebanese businessmen are expected to attend the conference. Ten sector workshops will present opportunities for investors in oil and gas, power, mining, agriculture, housing, information & communication technologies (ICT), tourism, transport and logistics, trade and industry, and entrepreneurship.

A total of 121 projects will be discussed with the sector breakdown as follows: energy and mining (26 per cent); housing and utilities (26 per cent); transport and logistics (16 per cent); trade and industry (11 per cent); tourism (9 per cent); ICT (6 per cent); agriculture (4 per cent); and social solidarity (2 per cent).

Of these 5 per cent of projects will be allocated to the private sector, 18 per cent to public private partnerships, 25 per cent to the public sector and 53 per cent per cent will be public-led projects with potential investment bank involvement.

Thirty projects have been allocated to 15 investment banks by the ministry of investment to expedite project execution for the summit and three of these will be promoted by CI Capital in the transport, electricity and property development sectors – of which one of the projects is worth an estimated 10 billion Egyptian pounds (Dh4.81bn).

Four projects will be promoted by Cairo Financial Holding (CFH) in transport, property development, tourism and petrochemicals.

Another four will be promoted by Pioneers Holding Company in the tourism sector, the projects have an estimated cost of 20bn pounds.

Current UAE investments in Egypt total 76bn pounds.

Sources: official summit website, Egypt’s general authority for investments (GAFI) and investors’ brief for US-Egypt business council presented by the minister of investment

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