The Forecast For Consumer Goods

Mohamed Samir, president for the IMEA region at $223bn consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble, details the company’s new slimline brand strategy and shares his expectations for the months ahead.

- Robert Anderson

The last 12 months have surely been some of the most memorable in the 27-year career of Mohamed Samir – the president of India, Middle East and Africa at the world’s largest consumer goods company Procter & Gamble.

On the one hand there was external change as the Middle East region and other key markets tackled economic difficulties linked to low oil prices and currency fluctuations, and on the other the American multinational was in the middle of an efficiency drive designed to produce a leaner operation.

In October, P&G completed the sale of its struggling beauty business to Coty for $12.5bn in a complex deal designed to allow it to focus more heavily on its core brands. It also continued on a cost reduction strategy with the aim of cutting $10bn over the next five years.

This period was coupled with Samir’s transition to the UAE just over six months ago where, speaking from his new base in Dubai’s Jebel Ali Free Zone, he forecasts further change on the horizon.

“What’s happening in the region is kind of a restart. In general expectations are changing, but the good news is South Asia – so all India and Pakistan – this area is all going nicely," Samir explains.

Amid this restart, he believes perceptions of the Middle East as a fast growing market will need to change as the good years of oil prices exceeding $100 a barrel slowly edge out of view.

“The Middle East will continue growing but it will not grow like it did before,” he says.