The Brussels-headquartered company has announced that its Egyptian entity is now up and running and will be headed up by Fakhr El-Deen.
Based in Cairo, the entity, Univar Egypt LLC, includes an office and warehouse space and will allow the company to store products in the region to facilitate ease of delivery to local clients.
In addition, clients will benefit from invoicing and payment in local currency, the company said.
According to El-Deen, who has joined Univar from a large, local chemical distribution company, having a physical presence in Cairo is very important.
Egypt: ‘dynamic market’
“Egypt is a very dynamic market with a lot of opportunities, and having a local presence in Cairo is invaluable,” he said.
“We are already seeing a lot of activity here and there is a tremendous potential for many of our key business areas, including personal care, household and industrial cleaning, energy, food, pharmaceuticals and coatings,” he added.
Although no firm data exists on the exact market size and the split between industries, the company said its research suggests Egypt offers several hundred million dollars of opportunity.
“We expect that over time we would be able to take a considerable share of that market, with a particular focus on the specialty portion of the market,” a Univar spokesperson told CosmeticsDesign-Europe.com.
Competitive edge
Univar will be one of the first global chemical distributors to have a local presence in what is described as a ‘fragmented’ distribution market, which the company hopes will give it a competitive edge over other international players.
According to the spokesperson, Univar’s presence in the country combines the benefits of local distribution and warehousing with the technical support of a multi-national player.
“In particular multi-national customers who have factories in Egypt are looking to the service provided by a local company such as warehousing and swift product delivery, but with the added value services technical support and supplier portfolio of a major multi-national distribution supplier,” the spokesperson said.
“As those customers are requiring those services and we are one of the first multi-national distributors to be here then we are in a prime position to leverage that position,” the spokesperson added.