Entrepreneurship: A game-changer post Arab Spring? Arabia Monitor publishes new Regional Views report in collaboration with Angels’ Den, Mowgli and Norman Broadbent
This press release summarizes a new report by Arabia Monitor on entrepreneurship in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. It finds that while entrepreneurial activity in MENA is lower than other emerging economies, there are positive signs such as many entrepreneurs being young, educated and motivated by opportunity rather than necessity. However, obstacles to entrepreneurship in MENA include lack of access to capital, limited business training, and difficult regulatory environments. The report argues that fostering entrepreneurship could help address high youth unemployment in the region and lay the groundwork for economic growth.
Missing Piece in MENA’s Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Puzzle Webinar PresentationMowgli Foundation
Further to the release of our recent report, “Nurturing Human Capital: the Missing Piece of MENA’s Entrepreneurship Puzzle”, we hosted a webinar which was chaired by Tony Bury, Mowgli’s Founder and Chairman. Tony shared our thoughts and insights from the report and created an active dialogue around this key missing piece of the puzzle.
Tony Bury Presentation: Family Forum International 2011Mowgli Foundation
Family businesses dominate the Middle East. There are numerous challenges in sustaining the growth of these businesses. Tony Bury, founder of the Mowgli Foundation (a mentoring organisation for entrepreneurs) suggests in this presentation to Family Forum International that injecting a spirit of entrepreneurship is the key to passing businesses from generation to generation in the Arab World.
CGI is Innovation Consulting: with a design thinking mindset of IDEO, and the business capability of McKinsey, all of that combined with the entrepreneurial spirit of the best startups.
Highlights of August for CGI are:
✔ Incubation Management Workshop
✔ Startup Cohort 1 at NUML, Islamabad
✔ Startup Cohort 1 at LCWU, Lahore
Missing Piece in MENA’s Entrepreneurship Ecosystem Puzzle Webinar PresentationMowgli Foundation
Further to the release of our recent report, “Nurturing Human Capital: the Missing Piece of MENA’s Entrepreneurship Puzzle”, we hosted a webinar which was chaired by Tony Bury, Mowgli’s Founder and Chairman. Tony shared our thoughts and insights from the report and created an active dialogue around this key missing piece of the puzzle.
Tony Bury Presentation: Family Forum International 2011Mowgli Foundation
Family businesses dominate the Middle East. There are numerous challenges in sustaining the growth of these businesses. Tony Bury, founder of the Mowgli Foundation (a mentoring organisation for entrepreneurs) suggests in this presentation to Family Forum International that injecting a spirit of entrepreneurship is the key to passing businesses from generation to generation in the Arab World.
CGI is Innovation Consulting: with a design thinking mindset of IDEO, and the business capability of McKinsey, all of that combined with the entrepreneurial spirit of the best startups.
Highlights of August for CGI are:
✔ Incubation Management Workshop
✔ Startup Cohort 1 at NUML, Islamabad
✔ Startup Cohort 1 at LCWU, Lahore
In most developed nations, corporate social responsibility
(CSR) initiatives center on issues such as environmental sustainability, alternative energy, clean technology, and social welfare. Driving these activities, more often than not, is a company’s desire to appeal to strong consumer sentiment. But in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), CSR is becoming something fundamentally different.
Islamic Economy - How Tech Entrepreneurs Can Capture OpportunitiesMuhammad Chbib
This presentation was part of a speech at an event (TechForum) in Dubai on March 10th, 2015, organized by Dubai Silicon Oasis. Islamic Economy has become a Mega Trend recently. Not only outnumbers the Muslim population the Christian population globally, but it also offers a lot of entrepreneurial opportunities.
This segment is mostly untapped. The presentation takes a very quick glance at this Mega Trend and discusses how for example a City like Dubai can play a significant role in shaping this entrepreneurial field into a globally relevant business segment.
The author, Muhammad Chbib, is a serial entrepreneur with a focus on Islamic Economy topics.
A presentation on how important entrepreneurship education is to various levels of institution. Entrepreneurship is the core of our module. This is for entrepreneurial idea in entrepreneurship establishments.
The female-millenial-a-new-era-of-talentPwC España
Las mujeres millennials, entre los 20 y los 30 años, creen que, todavía, las oportunidades que les ofrecen las empresas no son las mismas que para los hombres de su generación
Understanding barriers to youth entrepreneurship as a career choice for youth...Masum Hussain
People say this is the age of business as it is backed by sophisticated technologies, blessed by loads of relevant information. & in this business age the young people are leading from the front as entrepreneurs. Wherever you go from Silicon Valley to Middle East young talents are making significant marks in creating new businesses even sometime more efficiently than the older experienced people. Think of Mark Zukerbourgh, or Michael Yung, they are shaking the world with their innovational business ventures, & people like them are at speed in growing. Different studies provide proof that the young people are the greatest contributors in the arena of business.
Sylhet is a division & a major city of North Eastern area of Bangladesh. This city is rapidly growing than the other cities of this country because of her peoples increasing purchasing power as the area is booming with business projects, a lots of liquid money is in the hands of the peoples as a result of remittance provided by the people living abroad. As we know many people of this area lives in different wealthy country of the world mainly in the United Kingdom (as we know in London there is a town named ‘ Bangla Town’ mainly inhabited by the Sylheties) & middle east many families have enough money in hand almost all the time. Problem with the Sylheti’s is that though they have money they are not interested in investing them in the country for business purpose as most of them are risk averse , & do not know the ABC of business.
In most developed nations, corporate social responsibility
(CSR) initiatives center on issues such as environmental sustainability, alternative energy, clean technology, and social welfare. Driving these activities, more often than not, is a company’s desire to appeal to strong consumer sentiment. But in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), CSR is becoming something fundamentally different.
Islamic Economy - How Tech Entrepreneurs Can Capture OpportunitiesMuhammad Chbib
This presentation was part of a speech at an event (TechForum) in Dubai on March 10th, 2015, organized by Dubai Silicon Oasis. Islamic Economy has become a Mega Trend recently. Not only outnumbers the Muslim population the Christian population globally, but it also offers a lot of entrepreneurial opportunities.
This segment is mostly untapped. The presentation takes a very quick glance at this Mega Trend and discusses how for example a City like Dubai can play a significant role in shaping this entrepreneurial field into a globally relevant business segment.
The author, Muhammad Chbib, is a serial entrepreneur with a focus on Islamic Economy topics.
A presentation on how important entrepreneurship education is to various levels of institution. Entrepreneurship is the core of our module. This is for entrepreneurial idea in entrepreneurship establishments.
The female-millenial-a-new-era-of-talentPwC España
Las mujeres millennials, entre los 20 y los 30 años, creen que, todavía, las oportunidades que les ofrecen las empresas no son las mismas que para los hombres de su generación
Understanding barriers to youth entrepreneurship as a career choice for youth...Masum Hussain
People say this is the age of business as it is backed by sophisticated technologies, blessed by loads of relevant information. & in this business age the young people are leading from the front as entrepreneurs. Wherever you go from Silicon Valley to Middle East young talents are making significant marks in creating new businesses even sometime more efficiently than the older experienced people. Think of Mark Zukerbourgh, or Michael Yung, they are shaking the world with their innovational business ventures, & people like them are at speed in growing. Different studies provide proof that the young people are the greatest contributors in the arena of business.
Sylhet is a division & a major city of North Eastern area of Bangladesh. This city is rapidly growing than the other cities of this country because of her peoples increasing purchasing power as the area is booming with business projects, a lots of liquid money is in the hands of the peoples as a result of remittance provided by the people living abroad. As we know many people of this area lives in different wealthy country of the world mainly in the United Kingdom (as we know in London there is a town named ‘ Bangla Town’ mainly inhabited by the Sylheties) & middle east many families have enough money in hand almost all the time. Problem with the Sylheti’s is that though they have money they are not interested in investing them in the country for business purpose as most of them are risk averse , & do not know the ABC of business.
Similar to Entrepreneurship: A game-changer post Arab Spring? Arabia Monitor publishes new Regional Views report in collaboration with Angels’ Den, Mowgli and Norman Broadbent
Next generation Africa-GCC Business Ties in a Digital EconomyDubaiChamber
Next-generation Africa-GCC Business Ties in a Digital Economy is an Economist Intelligence Unit report, sponsored by Dubai Chamber of Commerce and Industry. The report explores the perspectives of young entrepreneurs and investors in Africa and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries on building business relationships, identifying challenges to overcome and spotting opportunities that await. The report is based on extensive desk research and in-depth interviews with entrepreneurs and investors in Africa and the GCC, with a focus on millennials. The interviews were conducted between June and August 2017
India, Singapore, Middle East and Africa – quarterly reviewBrunswick Group
This quarterly newsletter focuses on the three overarching themes impacting the region: Connectivity, Commodities and Energy, and the Rising New Middle Class. The unprecedented connectivity between these nations is enabling unprecedented movement of people, goods, services, and ideas accelerated by innovation and new technologies. Their economies are driven by commodities and energy fueling economic growth and creating future opportunity, while presenting long-term challenges from pollution to climate change.
The business outlook across Asia for 2014 looks set for a positive trajectory, but there are a number of uncertainties that will have many business leaders watching over their shoulders.
The latest Executive Outlook Survey 2014 from KellyOCG shows that while there is widespread agreement about continuing economic and business improvement, it is not unbridled optimism.
Global economic events and local Asian business sentiment are coalescing in 2014 to produce a whirlwind of possible scenarios for the world economy.
4th Venture Capital in MENA Report ( 2013 in review) MENA Private Equity Asso...Rami Al-Karmi
4th Venture Capital in MENA Report ( 2013 in review) MENA Private Equity Association includes my thought leadership piece on page 19 - Section4 titled :
Entrepreneurship versus Business as usual in MENA - the "new reality"
Start up support as innovative opportunity for uae investorsMusthafa-Almana
Musthafa & Almana is an international consultancy firm having presence in 4 countries. Our expertise lies in providing bespoke and innovative solutions to our clients’ requirements, while leveraging our deep understanding of the unique cultural and commercial nuances that exist in each jurisdiction that we operate under. Our clients span multiple industries and sectors and range from start-ups to government entities.
The VC4Africa 2015 Venture Finance in Africa report shows an increasing number of African businesses successfully growing their operations over time. They generate an increasing amount of revenue and add new jobs to the African market place.
VC4Africa aims to be the world’s leading social network for entrepreneurs and investors in Africa. The VC4Africa community has over 17,000 members in 159 countries, including 600 investors. 2000 entrepreneurs in Africa present their companies on the platform: early stage ventures that require investments less than USD 1 million. Each venture is scalable, makes smart use of technology, or is disruptive in their application of a business model.
There is little information available on this emerging segment and there are few comparative studies. VC4Africa reached out to entrepreneurs and investors part of the community to find out more about their progress. While VC4Africa’s data sets do not represent the total African investment space, the research certainly indicates key trends.
Diving deep into literally millions of interactions and conversations with different networks such as Facebook, Twitter and Instagram, blogs, forums and news sites in order to bring you analytical info about how social media affects different sectors like:Sharing Economy, Banking and Finance, Ecommerce, Telecom and Fintech.
Waves of change: revisited – Insurance opportunities in Sub-Saharan AfricaEY
EY and Oxford Economics surveyed 125 insurance executives in seven countries in sub-Saharan Africa to identify factors powering the growth of the insurance sector and determine how companies are balancing opportunities and risks.
The global microfinance market should once again achieve growth of 15-20% in 2015- Credit- RESPONSABILITY. Asia is displaying the strongest growth momentum. A particularly impressive development in this region is the revival of India’s microfinance market. Central Asia is being impacted by the economic crisis in Russia, leading to a slight slowdown in financial sector development compared to previous years.
■ According to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), economic growth in the 20 most important microfinance markets will increase from 4.4% to 4.8% in 2015. This means that microfinance countries will probably grow at twice the rate of developed economies.
■ The 32 experts interviewed by responsAbility for this report have not seen any evidence of a backlog in reforms in their respective countries. Instead, they believe that the institutional environment for microfinance institutions (MFIs) is improving – both in terms of regulatory supervision by the authorities and market infrastructure.
■ These experts take a critical view of the reduced portfolio quality of MFIs. This calls for stricter risk management on the part of MFIs as well as the asset managers investing in them.
■ In terms of financing, local sources of financing are becoming increasingly important. International investors continue to play a major role but MFIs are seeking to focus on a smaller number of stronger financing partners.
Similar to Entrepreneurship: A game-changer post Arab Spring? Arabia Monitor publishes new Regional Views report in collaboration with Angels’ Den, Mowgli and Norman Broadbent (20)
Mowgli: The Power of Mentorship_SME Advisor Magazine article_Dubai_October 2012Mowgli Foundation
Mowgli recently held a Mowgli Jam, quarterly get together between mentors and entrepreneurs, in Dubai where Tony Bury, Mowgli's Founder, shared his thoughts on why mentoring is so important, especially for entrepreneurs and why it it is so important for the MENA region. Mowgli Entrepreneurs and Mentors then shared their stories and journey with the audience...bringing Mowgl's mission to life!
The typical Mowgli Mentoring Experience (MME) commences with a 3-day workshop which includes 1 day of mentor training, 1 day of mentor and entrepreneur matching and 1 day of facilitated mentoring relationship building, followed by a year of on-going support and supervision.
Free speed mentoring event for business owners and aspiring entrepreneurs. The event will give group and one-to-one opportunities to discuss your business issues.
In November 2010 the Mowgli Foundation matched 7 entrepreneurs with 7 mentors, facilitating 1-year mentoring relationships.This was our UK pilot programme, launched after delivering many successful programmes in the Middle East. The results point to the positive impact of mentoring.
Mowgli Foundation: Call for Palestine Business Mentors! 14-15 April 2012. Mowgli, a charity who supports small enterprises, is now recruiting participants for their first Palestine mentoring programmes. Read the below and apply!
Flavrbox was born in 2011, a project which combines Sebastien’s interest in communications with his passion for sustainable local produce. Flavrbox is a platform to champion independent food producers through e-commerce, giving people an opportunity to connect with the high quality food available in their communities. Sebastien feels Mowgli mentoring could be of most benefit for him in his role at Flavrbox.
Mowgli Foundation: Mentoring Entrepreneurs for LearningMowgli Foundation
The Mowgli Foundation team have put together a research briefing summarising some relevant research into mentoring for entrepreneurs. We hope you find it useful.
Mowgli Foundation's South West mentoring programmes for entrepreneurs are covered in the Bristol Evening Post, Bristol, UK. Featuring Rob Salvidge and Tristan Hogg.
Mentoring Young Entrepreneurs: EMCC Presentation 2011Mowgli Foundation
Mowgli Mentors Kristin and Carole presented the case study of their distance mentoring relationship with mentee entrepreneurs in the Middle East at the EMCC conference, Paris, 2011.
Mowgli Foundation launches support for entrepreneurs in South West UK. Coverage of our launch event in Clifton Life magazine with images of Lord Mayor Geoff Gollop and Pieminister's Tristan Hogg. Bristol
Mowgli Foundation Impact Report: MENA region (Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine). How many jobs do our entrepreneurs create? and other information about our programmes. For more information visit www.mowgli.org.uk.
Entrepreneurship: A game-changer post Arab Spring? Arabia Monitor publishes new Regional Views report in collaboration with Angels’ Den, Mowgli and Norman Broadbent
1. Press Release – Regional Views: Entrepreneurship– 14. XI. 2012 Arabia Monitor
Economic and Market Research
Entrepreneurship: A game-changer post Arab Spring?
Arabia Monitor publishes new Regional Views report in collaboration with
Angels’ Den, Mowgli and Norman Broadbent
Florence Eid, Ph.D, Chief Economist
Melissa Moubarak, Analyst
London, November 14th - In the MENA region, 12% of the adult population has started a private business, compared to an
average of 18% in emerging Latin American economies and 5% in G7 countries. The opportunities for investing in start-up
enterprises are compelling, and fostering an environment conducive to entrepreneurship will ease the pressure on labor
markets, where the average youth unemployment rate of 27% in the region’s cohort group of 18-35 (more than one third
of the population) is the highest worldwide.
Over the next 10 years, the net entry into the job market across MENA is expected to reach 57.1M. This would imply the
need for a 40% expansion in jobs available, just to keep unemployment at current levels. MENA entrepreneurs are typically
young (30% under 35) and educated (49.5% with at least a secondary school degree), thus associating more closely with
youth unemployment and underscoring the importance of this conduit in tackling youth unemployment.
Across MENA 46% engage in private enterprise to be independent and increase their wealth, rather than solely out of
necessity, compared to 55% in G7 countries and on par with LatAm. This is an encouraging indicator, as entrepreneurs
driven by opportunity will seek to grow their business, rather than focus on subsistence solely, triggering a virtuous cycle of
innovation and job creation. In fact, 33% of MENA entrepreneurs expect to employ at least five workers over the next five
years.
Access to capital for start-ups in need of micro-financing (almost 40% of entrepreneurs estimate they need less than USD
10K to start their business) is difficult, despite the liquidity surplus in the region, and this is where angel investors and seed
funding come in. Currently, on average, only 22% of MENA entrepreneurs are financed by such institutions. Yet the capital
requirement dynamics provide a compelling argument as 37.2% of investors surveyed expect to recoup between twice and
five times their original investment over a decade. The risks are also commensurate, as over 45% expect to be paid back
their initial investment or less over the same period.
Another area of improvement lies in formal education and mentorship of entrepreneurs. While on average one third of
entrepreneurs in emerging markets (Ex-BRIC) have received some sort of business training, the level in MENA drops to 17%.
The lack of an adequate regulatory infrastructure makes MENA one of the most difficult places to start a business
worldwide, following LatAm & Sub-Saharan Africa.
With over 65% of entrepreneurial support initiatives coming from the private sector, governments have a long way to go to
prove their start-up friendliness. Slowly but surely, the MENA region is catching up with more established entrepreneurial
havens and in our view, the Arab youth’s newfound interconnectedness through social media is a game-changer that will
help overcome obstacles standing in the way of innovative enterprise.
Arabia Monitor is an independent research firm specialized in economic and market studies on the Middle East & North African
region, which we view as the new emerging market. Our forward looking perspective allows us to place current developments
in the region within a broader context and a long-term view. Our analysis is based on the macroeconomic and financial balance
sheet of the Arab region and delivers unique strategy insights and forecasts to businesses across sectors.
To learn more about our offering and how we could add value to your operations, visit www.arabiamonitor.com
Arabia Monitor
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