The Destination
Egypt is emerging as a regional hub for the ICT industry in Africa and Middle East. Egypt, maintaining its economy intact under the brunt of the world economic crisis and the financial crunch, is attracting FDA to stimulate growth.
Through a set of regulations and deregulations, Egypt is deep rooting itself as a regional information and communications technology powerhouse, exerting its resources and capabilities across the international market that embraces not only the Middle East and the Gulf countries, but South Asia and India as well.
Since its inception in 1999, the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology (MCIT) has been working specifically to facilitate Egypt's transition into the global information society. Egypt is building a strong and durable information society for the future.
It is determined to decrease the digital divide and position itself firmly among its peers in the international arena. The Government of Egypt is committed to offering every individual, business and the community at large the opportunity to grasp the benefits of the new information era.
To reinforce the country's e-readiness, the Egyptian promises unified e-strategies on the national level to set a credible national ICT plan that places heavy emphasis on joint public-private partnership efforts and the role of civil society for long-term success.
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In the meantime, Egypt ranks above Eastern European locations such as the Czech Republic, Hungary and Poland as well as other Middle East and African locations such as South Africa and Tunisia as an outsourcing destination. Global information communications technology (ICT) companies such as Cisco, Google, IBM, Microsoft, Oracle and Orange Business Services are already exploiting Egypt's IT talent pool. Egypt allows high levels of foreign ownership of ICT companies. The allowed foreign ownership in Egypt has no limit. This will have a positive effect on GDP. The average age is 24-years old in Egypt. This indicates that the workforce is very young and trainable. The Government of Egypt recognizes the ICT sector as a critical component of the national economy, not only due to its substantial contribution to employment, exports and diversification of the economy, but for its dynamic and innovative potential, and its broader role in providing enabling technologies, products and services that underpin the development of Egypt as a knowledge economy in the global market. Egypt's telecommunications infrastructure has increased dramatically over the last decade. Fixed telephone lines have shown a steady increase, from 7.5 million in 2000 to almost 10.5 million in 2009. At the end of 2001, two private mobile operators were servicing 3.4 million mobile users. By 2009, this figure had increased to over 50 million, as a third mobile operator was awarded a license in 2006. The ICT sector has sustained double-digit growth and continues to be one of the fastest growing sectors in the economy. Foreign direct investment in Egypt over the past few years has reached $10 billion USD. IT foreign direct investment accounts for 10% of the total FDI; $1 billion has been invested in infrastructure and ICT tools and services. As the GDP has grown at 7% in 2008, the ICT sector has grown to double digits reaching 20% growth ahead of the overall economy. And even with growth declining as a result of the crisis, it proved better than expectations, reaching above 5%, while it was not expected to rise above 4% - a relatively higher rate than most countries. |
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