eB2B Trucking 101: Massive opportunity lies largely untouched
B2B trucking across the MENATP region is a massive USD 80 Bn market
Luxury Retail: Online opening new horizons
Creators are now playing an equally important role compared to celebrities as the content is more relatable and the format is more engaging
MENA Games Market To Surpass $5 Billion Mark
Beyond the mentioned growth drivers, this massive growth also stems from the growing consumer influx from under appreciated cohorts such as females and Gen Z.
UAE Luxury Retail – Strong Tailwinds at play
Online channel has increased in prominence and now makes up ~20% of luxury sales in UAE currently influencing more than 90%
MENAP Digital Economy to cross $100B this year; $20bn investment needed to unlock 7x growth
The MENAP Digital Economy will multiply 7x by 2030; this will require a funding of ~$20 Bn in the coming 2-3 years
D2C channel to represent 12% of MENA e-tail, as early as 2023!
Consumers express high interest to explore new brands across sectors, driving adoption of Digitally native brands (DNB)
Our MENA Dark Kitchen estimates revised upwards – a $2 Bn+ opportunity by 2025!
Dark Kitchens would account for 13%+ of the FoodTech market in 2025 the penetration would be significantly higher in UAE & KSA
Pakistan E-com is now on Boom Alert
Fueled by recent funding, the Pakistan digital landscape is now set to take of as players storm the market
The UAE Pre-owned market is the new market
Buying is seen as a better value-added proposition especially for home and electronics sectors where the estimated duration of use can be higher.
Unwrapping Ramadan 2022 Recap – Above All Years
Celebrations will drive Ramadan purchases and Grocery, Fashion key sectors that will see spike in demand
MENAT Retail; The Double Crest Wave
Ramadan days are expected to see 23% shoot up in sale
3 Themes to Look out for in 2022
These supply and demand trends have placed the Direct to consumer (D2C) channel on a pedestal of growth and this segment already accounts for ~15% of online retail in key e-tail markets in METAP.
MENAT Gaming: Doubling XP
The supply side is gearing up to tap into the massive opportunity which is unfolding, through localization, technology investments and eSports events
Quick Commerce: MENA’s Hidden Gems
Q-commerce with sectors that already have the necessary digital infrastructure and consumer awareness in the MENA region expands the market potential for quick commerce to encompass a $100 Bn opportunity .
OTT Changing How We Understand Television
OTT market has seen ~2x jump in the userbase compared to Pre-Pandemic times.
Black Friday Recap: Discounts Moving Beyond Electronics
A key trend that was alluded to coming into the Black Friday event is the further inclusion of sectors such as Beauty & Personal Care and Fashion into the promotional offerings.
Black Friday: The Retail Spectacle for all Ages
Sector appeal slightly varies among the different generations with Gen Z being most inclined towards Fashion this Black Friday.
Quick Commerce: “Instant” becoming the norm in delivery
Within e-tailing alone, instant Delivery is expected to contribute to 8% of GMV in the next 3 years
The time is right for eHealth in MENA
eHealth platforms have come in to drive efficiencies and create value for consumers and suppliers
The BNPL wave is rising
The BNPL sector has scaled well – we estimate USD 0.6 Bn of GTV will be processed in MENA in 2021
MENAP eB2B: USD 10 Bn opportunity unfolding
The USD 1 Bn eB2B market is setting itself up for explosive growth with penetration levels <0.5%
Understanding CPaaS: Softbank’s First Saudi Investment
CPaaS could represent a USD 5 Bn+ opportunity in MENA by 2030
The Revival of Tourism
We expect the sector to multiply 4x from 2020 levels to represent a USD 165 Bn market by 2025
The Rise of Conversational commerce
Time spent on digital media has shot up over the last 1-2 years; social media & Messaging is the most consumed channel.
Digital Economy : Fintech leads in Growth
With 1 in 4 deals being in the fintech space and pulling nearly 30% of all the funding raised, the sector is poised for strong activity with the new liquidity
MEA: Dissecting the $2bn Funding upsurge
MEA investments surged to USD 2.1 Bn YTD in 2021, already ~2x of last year
Black Friday 2021 – Looking Beyond Discounts
More than 95% of consumers plan to use some digital channel for product discovery this Black Friday.
Digital Economy : Fintech leads in Growth
Insurtech and Lending growth is expected to be ~5 times higher in future
Monetizing shortform, the Tiktok way
Social and video media platforms such as Facebook and YouTube soon followed providing consumers with new ways to interact and brands adopted those platforms for ads.
MENA Q-commerce: Unlocking $20bn
MENA Q-commerce market is expected to grow by 24% to reach $20bn as consumers continue looking for convenience and immediate gratification.
eGrocery: Pureplay Etailers drive growth
In a span of one year, we have seen the KSA eGrocery market grow from negligible share in 2019 to 1% in 2020. However KSA’s eGrocery maturity still lags compared to other economies.
Etail Leadership – Horizontals lead but face headwinds
Etailing Horizontals are the distinct leaders while Specialists are lagging
Ground Zero 5.0 – MENA Internet Economy Coming Of Age – A Recap
MENA Digital Economy to reach new heights
Prime Day – Amazon’s Yearly Festival of Sales
UAE Prime Day is still in emerging phase with 140% sales increase from an ordinary day compared to 250% in US
MENA Ramadan: Biggest Shopping Moment
Electronics and Gaming were highly dominated by online channel whereas Kitchen & Dining and Jewelry by offline channel
QSR Market: Always Adapting to Change
QSR’s are usually met with the trade-off between focusing on their own app vs a marketplace app. Each have their own pros and cons. Broadly, having one’s own app creates better control of the brand, greater engagement with the customer but it is a high cost and effort activity in terms of building a userbase and capabilities.
MENA Food Service Market – Going Back to Normal
Online Food service market penetration to remain stable at around 15-20%
Kitchen Drives Home
Horizontals have captured majority of market share
Keeping up with the consumer
Q-commerce has enabled consumers to try new online categories because of its convenience thus increasing the share of wallet.
MENA Electronics: An Essential Sector to Online Retail
MENA online electronics has ~3x penetration levels compared to online retail
MENA Fashion – Trendsetter in Retail
Offline fashion is poised to recover this year while online fashion is growing strong Y-o-Y
MENA Online Retail – Gaining Ground in the Global Space
The MENA market has grown significantly in recent years and its GMV has become comparable to other emerging economies such as India and Indonesia.
Ramadan – Importance to Retail
Ramadan 2021 to contribute more than $2Bn to e-tail GMV, 2x that of 2019
Foodtech – A Growing Appetite
Players have been innovating to improve profitability, more players expected to enter
MENA Startups – Going the IPO way
Consumer shift towards online is permanent and will drive further growth
Q-commerce | The Demand For Speed
Q-commerce is a market defined by very fast delivery from local shops, restaurants, and dark stores. It is usually characterized by under 2-hour delivery.
Social Media Spend Goes Mainstream
Social media now accounts for almost half of the digital advertising spend in the MENA region. We expect that in 2021, social media ad spend will overtake non-digital/traditional media spending in our region.
Where is the online meat market headed?
Meat market is expected to become $80-85 Bn by 2024 and is up for disruption by branded players
Edtech – Entrée or Main Course ?
EdTech platforms have seen a drastic rise in the number of new subscribers to the platforms.
KaaS – The backbone of Dark Kitchens?
UAE online food delivery is expected to grow by a CAGR of 23% with rising penetration of dark kitchens
e-Grocery – Rising Maturity in Kuwait
e-Grocery players that address the pain areas will grow faster than the market
BNPL – The growing relevance of BNPL platforms in the UAE
BNPL players in the UAE have only just entered the market and have cumulatively received approximately $40 million+ in funding.
Cash on Delivery – Another casualty of the pandemic?
Fast forward to today and this is reflected in usage of COD which has come down to ~20-30% of online shopping orders in UAE. One possible reason is the expected stickiness of ~60%.
2021: The year Crtl C + Ctrl V won’t work
Social media penetration stands at 99% in UAE and 72% in KSA.
White Friday – The Evolution of Consumer Sentiment
An interesting factor is that an overwhelmingly large proportion of consumers believe that discounts during the white/yellow friday period are higher online than they are offline.
A new Silver Lining to India’s Meat Market
Online meat has grown 2.5-3x since COVID, with a large growth runway ahead
Dark Kitchens – The Bright Future of Food Services
Pre-COVID estimates of $16bn, the food services market is now estimated at $9bn in UAE as lockdown restrictions suppressed the sector.
The Power of Exclusive Sales – Amazon Prime Day UAE 2020
Consumers took advantage of the ~3000 deals on Amazon UAE during Prime Day which offered an average discount of 25-30%.
“Add to Cart” || Anticipations of Festive Sales in UAE
Q4 Festive sales to reach ~$1.5 Bn at a 65% y-o-y growth rate
e-Grocery in UAE & KSA: Q3 Update Report Pre-view
MENA e-Grocery GMV had been growing in double digits YoY until 2019, and was expected to grow at ~60%. However, Covid-19 has more than doubled the eGrocery markets in UAE & KSA.
Retail-Tech – The next start-up opportunity
This is reflected in the ~15-25% increase in online shoppers in the first few weeks of lockdown. ~30-50% of the customers increased their online purchase for the essential categories.
Hypergrowth in eGrocery – The new-age digital playing field
This increase in eGrocery purchases was propelled in part by a significant number of first-time users of online grocery platforms. What is interesting is that consumers depict intent to continue this behavior even after the situation normalizes.
How MENA is shopping post COVID-19?
Lockdown measures have led to growth for e-tail. The growth rate during the lockdown has been ~20% by order volume and ~40% by value resulting in annualized GMV of $11 Bn.
COVID-19 Pandemic; E-tail the lifeline of MENA
Grocery is the hottest category with 300%+ jump in daily order volume
Ramadan and Covid-19 Pandemic; an ordeal for retail
E-tailers generate ~25% of their annual GMV during Ramadan time, which when compared with White/Yellow Friday sale, stands at ~5%. Brands also realize the importance of Ramadan where many engage in activities such as launch of new products, new services, bundling of offers. A third of their annual marketing budget is spend in promotion of the same.
Venture Studios – Innovations in start-up building in MENA
Venture Studio – A new business model is emerging to support the start-up building space globally
MENA gearing up for Ramadan – Fashion insights
1. Fashion shopping in Ramadan peaks during Eid week Fashion is the most exciting retail category, when it comes to Ramadan shopping in MENA. Excitement levels for clothing are high throughout the festival season, however it peaks during the Eid week. When this trend was studied at country level, UAE and KSA followed the same […]
Middle East Online Retail comes of age (Part 2)
1: Niche models gain traction Noon and Amazon have emerged as the key players in the online marketplace in the region. However, niche players have also emerged who either have a specific focus on customer segment, category or business model. Some niche marketplace examples are around grocery, value focussed, pre-loved fashion and gifting: 2: Electronics continues to […]
Middle East Online Retail comes of age in 2019
Insight 1: Fast-paced etailing market growth in 2019 Online retail market grew at a fast pace this year compared to last few years – greater than 35% this year compared to ~25% annually over the last few years.
November Online Festive Sales Expected to Soar
There are four key insights that we want to highlight from our study: Published on: Nov 2019 Customer excitement for the November sales season in both UAE and KSA is at its highest with 90% of digitally active customers showing interest in this year’s sales season. November Festive days online GMV is expected to clock […]
The 3A’s shaping the food service market of UAE
Published on: Nov 2019 Food service market of UAE is ~$ 15 Bn in size. The market took a hit in revenues during early 2018 due to implementation of VAT, but the sector is back on track to provide a stellar performance going forward. We expect the key drivers to be – 1. Increased adoption […]
Innovation in business model helping improve online deliveries performance in GCC
Buy Full Report Logistics is driving eCommerce in GCC; the two key sectors of Etail and online food deliveries stand at ~$11 Bn, expected to grow ~3X in next five years Published on: Sep 2019 Etail and online food are the two biggest sectors where deliveries are playing a critical role. E-tail is currently observing […]
GCC – World’s first omni-channel superapp?
GCC – a unique market showing characteristics of both developed and developing markets GCC countries have most of their population concentrated in urban centres. This helps the organized retail players to make a deeper reach out to the population, resulting in a high representation of organized players in retail. This characteristic of the high share […]
Can MENA Have A Superapp?
Globally, apps are taking superapp journey by adding services to its offering and increasing per-customer revenue Published on: Jul 2019 A country/region becomes superapp ready when its large base of the population is smartphone first instead of desktop and the ecosystem of apps customized to local needs is not evolved. WeChat in China leveraged this […]
MENA Marketing Taking Social Media Journey
Business in MENA are taking digital journey led by social media, for marketing its products and services to customers Published on: Jul 2019 MENA region comprising of GCC, Levant and North Africa is home to 40+mn businesses represented by corporates, government, SMEs and self-employed. These businesses in the MENA region are increasingly using digital platforms […]
Online Retail Insights | Middle-East
Buy Full Report With technology driving businesses across the region, Retail technology enabler market is a picking up trend in Middle-east, driven by marketing solutions, analytics, and other retail support Published on: Jun 2019 Technology is playing a key role in driving the retail business in Middle-East. With Amazon-Souq and Jumia already crossing USD 1 […]
Online Grocery Market Updates | Middle-East
Buy Full Report Share of organized grocery retail in UAE+KSA is expected to increase to 80% by 2022, from current 60%; Unorganized grocery retail to shrink Published on: Jan 2019 RedSeer estimates grocery retail to grow at CAGR of ~5% to reach size of USD 73 Bn by 2022, from current USD 60 Bn for […]
Fintech Insights | Middle-East
1. Fintech: Funding in MENA fintech is led by lending and payment focused start-ups Published on: Oct 2018 Fintech based start-ups in the MENA region are seeing a lot of traction recently with a funding of ~USD115mn till date, of which ~75mn is received within last two years. UAE is the most popular geography among […]
Cab Aggregation Insights | Middle-East
1. Cab: After a first wave of rapid growth, MENA’s cab hailing market is ready for the next wave of expansion into smaller cities and realize its huge potential Published on: Sep 2018 MENA region’s online cabs market has grown rapidly to reach similar scale as its better funded regional peers in India and SE Asia in […]