UAE mobile phone market remains buoyant

When Abdullah Al Joufi came to the UAE nearly 15 years ago, he was almost penniless before he found a job earning Dh1,000.

Today, he is one of the best known businessmen in his community - thanks to the thriving mobile-phone market.

When he first arrived, Al Joufi decided he could not make much money here. Then he met a rich relative in Abu Dhabi and agreed to manage his business in Libya.

A few years later, Al Joufi was back in the UAE - impatient as ever - and looking to make his fortune. He worked on a heavy-duty vehicle, but without much luck. He went back home to Syria but - after a few years - returned to Abu Dhabi.

Al Joufi has always been impatient and perhaps this this made him more determined. When he returned to the UAE in the mid-1990s, mobile phones were just starting to trickle into the local market.

He never thought of mobile phones because he did not even own one. When he looks back, he laughs because today he owns six shops.

"The mobile-phone trade is a very profitable business in the UAE because there is a strong demand for mobile telephones and accessories," the 36-year-old businessman says.

"But that does not mean anyone can succeed. You need to have some experience in the trade and be capable of taking risks and meeting challenges. Many of my friends simply quit the business, but I and some others succeeded. I believe the UAE has great potential not only because of the rapid growth in the domestic market but because the UAE is a key re-export centre."

With modest capital in the mid-1990s, Al Joufi put all his money into a tiny mobile-phone shop on Defence Road, now the main mobile-phone shopping area in Abu Dhabi.

Two years later, he expanded his shop and bought more phones and accessories. He then decided to hire two employees to help with his growing business.

A year later, he opened another shop metres away. After a few months, his third shop was opened and business picked up tremendously, which encouraged him to expand his business to Dubai, where he opened two mobile and auto spare parts shops.

The stout, casually dressed Syrian, who does not look like a businessman, did not stop there. Last month, he opened one of the biggest mobile-phone shops in Abu Dhabi.

"When I first came here, I was looking for a job … now I provide jobs for more than 30 people from my village in Syria," he says. "I wish I could do more for them."

Al Joufi is among many Syrians and other expatriates who got lucky with the mobile-phone market, which is emerging as one of the most prosperous businesses in the region.

Mobile phones began sprouting up in the UAE ten years ago and growth came quickly.

From fewer than 10,000 mobile-phone users in the UAE in 1994, the number is more than three million today and is expected to hit 3.5 million by the end of the year. In some years, mobile-phone lines jumped by 40 per cent while sales swelled 20 to 30 per cent and the trend is expected to continue.

The growth has made many dealers rich.

"Some claim that the UAE mobile-phone market has become saturated," says Tawfeeq Gaddah, another phone dealer in Abu Dhabi.

"I tell you that there is big potential in this market. Most users keep updating their phones, while the introduction of camera and video phones and the multi-media message services has helped the market grow. You can call it mobile-phone mania in the UAE."

The UAE already has one of the highest mobile-phone penetration ratios in the world, with nearly 80 out of every 100 people owning a mobile phone.

The mobile-phone sector in the UAE has recorded one of the fastest growth rates in the region over the past five years, racing at between 30 to 50 per cent. With more than three million subscribers, the UAE represents nearly 10 per cent of the 30 million mobile-phone users in the Arab world as of the end of 2002.

Dealers estimate that between 1.5 million and 2 million mobiles phone were sold in the country last year with a value of nearly Dh2 billion ($545 million).

Several mobile-phone makers have struck deals with local agents or opened branches in Dubai to take advantage of the rapid market growth in the UAE. Dubai is the Middle East's main transhipment centre.

"Given the good pros-pects for this industry, I cannot say I will stop," Al Joufi said. "If there is potential for more shops here or there, why not?"