Tag: challenges

What do you think is the biggest challenge for Arab online startups? [Poll Results]

MMM 4 Comments

In the latest poll on StartUpArabia, the question to the readers was:
What do you think is the biggest challenge for Arab online startups?

The result of reader voting came out as follows:

Poll results: Challenges

Out of 62 readers who responded to the poll:
– 32% of them think that the main challenge for Arab startups is funding
– 26% think the immature online advertising market is the biggest challenge
– 15% responded that it was the low internet penetration in the region
– Another 15% blame the non conducive environment
– Only 10% thought trust was the biggest challenge
– and the remaining 3% specified other reasons like the lack of original ideas or targeting other markets other than the local one

Even though the list of challenges in this poll, and the ones added by the readers, might not be fully comprehensive, I think they actually give a good idea about the biggest challenges and problems that Arab startups and entrepreneurs face and have to tackle, and how important each one of them is.

What do you think is the biggest challenge for Arab online startups? [Poll]

MMM 8 Comments

A new poll has gone live on StartUpArabia, you can find it on the first sidebar on the right or vote straight from this post.

This poll asks:
What do you think is the biggest challenge for Arab online startups?

What do you think stands in the way of their success? What is holding them back? What are the biggest issues they have to deal with to move forward?

What do you think? If you think it’s something that’s not listed below, you can choose other and input the point you have in mind.

Feel free to further expand on your response in the comments section of this post.

Challenges To Web 2.0 In The Arab World

Guest 20 Comments
This guest blog is by Mohamed Nanabhay , Head of New Media at the AlJazeera Network based in Doha, Qatar.

Launching an internet company in the the region can be a challenging endevour. While there is lots of startup activity going on, it is worthwhile looking at what those challenges are when starting up or assessing the success rate of the newest kid on the block. The three big challenges facing entrepreneurs in the region are:

  1. Low internet penetration
    Across the entire Middle East and North Africa (MENA), you’re looking at approximately 25 million internet users (of which less than 6 million have broadband). But that doesn’t give you an accurate figure for the size of the market – to get that number we need to remove Iran and Israel which leaves us with an astonishing figure of under 10 million internet users and about 3 million broadband users.Whichever way you look at it, 10 million is not a big number. To put it into perspective, France alone has nearly 16 million internet users (with 12 million broadband users) but entrepreneurs are finding it difficult to start-up just for the French market. Loic Le Meur tells the story of Richard Branson telling him that his problem was that he was French which limited his market. Loic has moved to decided that it was too small a market to start Seesmic in so he moved to San Francisco.

    This of course does not mean it is impossible to build a company or site for the Arabic interweb, it just means that there is a problem of scale.

  2. Online advertising market immature
    So even if you managed to capture a sizable chunk of the online audience, you’re faced with a problem of revenue generation. Forget trying to build a business based on a subscription model (which is so 1.0 anyway) since credit card penetration is probably lower than internet penetration. So what you’re left with is seeking out online advertising or sponsorship.I have yet to see a serious player in this market (if you know of one please let me know ASAP) which sadly means that there is no serious underlying business model. This is changing slowly – Google has setup shop in the region and has been promoting Adwords to the marketing folk but I suspect it will take some time before we see impressive CPMs.
  3. The environment is not conducive for startups
    But even if there was an advertising model that worked, we’re still left with the fact that there isn’t a strong internet startup culture and most online plays lack any serious innovation. Even the sweet services from the TootCorp gang are more or less localised versions of Silicon Valley startups (Ikbis = Youtube & Watwet =Twitter).Of course, this problem isn’t limited to the region but it should be something people are concerned about. I’ve seen people being put down in so many ways when trying to launch something new and novel. I have two university students interning for me – they are super-smart, motivated and hardworking. There is no reason that they couldn’t build a rockin’ internet company. Unfortunately I’ve seen many people (from lecturers to people who should get it) continually being totally hostile to the web projects they work on. Definitely not the way to foster innovation….

    And lest we forget the bureaucracy…

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