Microsoft: Investing In Egypt Is Prominent

Ayman Abdellatif,  General Manager – Microsoft Egypt , started his words affirming that failures, trials and innovation are the cornerstones of any development in most of developed countries all over the world as well as well-known companies which succeeded to build its brand name such as Microsoft.

He pointed out that investors and decision makers in the Egyptian technology’s sector have to raise their investments in the human resource and to create the suitable climate,  encourage researches and, the most important, to provide better education to coop with the rapid developments in this sector all over the globe.

Abdellatif added that many Egyptian youth are aiming to work abroad seeking for a better climate, the thing that threatens any economy.

He pointed out that technology may be crucial solution for most of the current problems we are experiencing in the short term as well as long term amid many fields and sectors such as security, health and education, adding that the main question about the Egyptian technology industry must be “How can technology improve citizens life?” . I believe the answer will be “Through the effective use of information technology tools to raise productivity levels and reduce costs, and leading to faster recovery.”

Abdellatif affirmed that around the world – specially in major companies as united state, Germany and China – end users represent the most important factor in the economic cycle and acquire the major concern, adding that governments always tend to provide citizens with better climate, jobs, incomes and an overall better life which will reflect directly in stronger purchasing power.

He pointed out that many international companies began to direct a significant investment in the sector of “cloud computing”, including Microsoft, which is willing to acquire a larger share of this growing industry by creating new mechanisms, in addition to providing special prices and costs. He expected higher demand by international companies to provide these services in developing countries, especially that of North Africa that enjoy good growth opportunities, but on the other side, a sufficient capital to build the required infrastructure for this technology and for the establishment of data centers in addition to developing Internet and broadband networks.

General Manager of Microsoft Egypt, affirmed his company’s commitment to invest in permanent and long-term projects in the Egyptian market as well as strengthen the technology industry and local job creation, according to one of the earlier studies of IDC, the number of workers within Microsoft Egypt is equivalent to 50% of the total number of jobs related to information technology. Study added that Microsoft provides 55% of the total tax revenues from the IT sector, the study confirmed that for every LE achieved by Microsoft partners Microsoft.

Abdellatif  declared that Microsoft has a wide range of projects in the Egyptian market, on top of them is Microsoft’s Experts Center, destined to be the business hub in the Middle East and Africa, that brings together IT professionals to serve the needs of major institutions across the countries in the region, as well as to establishing Microsoft Research Center in Cairo, which is one of eight centers around the world, employing qualified Egyptian minds in the field of computer science. He added that the number of Microsoft partners are currently more than 1,100 partner.

Abdellatif  expected that the information technology market in Egypt will have high growth rates in the coming years after the end of global financial crisis, noting that the IT industry is currently witnessing a lot of tremendous steps following different countries and getting benefit from these developments in real life. We recently organized “Open Door” conference, which is a collection of various events intended for experts and tech professionals, developers, partners and executives to be a prelude to a series of similar conferences in the coming months and in order to bring together experts of IT field in one place.

Microsoft ‘s general manager said that Egypt imports about 600,0000 computers per year compared to Turkey, which imports 5 million units, proving the big difference between both markets taking into consideration both countries’ population. “More investment by the government in the field of infrastructure and improving economic conditions will surely increase this ratio” he affirmed.