International Business and Technology Blog

Lurking beneath the triumphant march toward the TTIP (the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership between the EU and the USA), formal negotiations for which began on 7th July, lies the somewhat less celebrated attempt at a trade agreement between the EU and Canada.

International trade shows play a critical role for companies looking to break into new markets and expand exports. While the costs can be higher than domestic shows, they can bring significant returns and help reduce lead times for new market entry or market expansion. In a survey of 500 companies, 83% classed trade shows as the 2^nd most important “tool” in the marketing mix after the corporate website’s home page.  

Finding good distributors is tough in any market but export markets can be particularly challenging. Even after you identify a good distributor you still have to support, monitor and manage them. For export markets there is the added frustration of relying on your distributor for market and end-client feedback.

Europe remains a great export destination, despite all its complexities. It is the largest destination for US exports and together, the US and Europe make up over half of world GDP and a third of global trade. While Europe is the world’s second-smallest continent, it boasts a GDP of over $17.5 trillion, with 11 of the world’s 20 largest consumer markets.

With so much attention focused on BRIC growth, it’s easy to forget just how important the Transatlantic Alliance already is:

What is the agreement about? In the last six years, Canada has concluded free trade agreements with nine countries: Colombia, Peru, Jordan, Panama, Honduras, and the European Free Trade Association that includes Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland. 

The world and business are online: levels of over 3.5 billion internet users and e-commerce revenues of $1.25 trillion are anticipated to be reached by 2013(1). In our increasingly 'hyperconnected' world, the importance of creating an effective and international online presence becomes apparent.

Last month The Wall Street Journey's Hannah Karp published an interesting article entitled “Teaching Americans to Export*."  It covers the recent success in Los Angeles, where export volume is growing at 31%/yr. vs. 10% for other US ports.  Key to this is a regional focus on export, where their success is even more remarkable given that only 15% of California's manufacturers are exporting.   

I was recently called upon by fDi Magazine, to serve on the judging panel in their 2nd Global Ranking of Economic Zones. Alongside other leading experts on the panel, I assessed more than 600 free zones from 120 different countries, judging them on criteria including facilities, promotion strategies, services, transportation, incentives offered, and cost-effectiveness as well as drawing on my expert knowledge and experiences.

 
FDI pages of an EDA’s websites come in many shapes and sizes but, for me, there are three clear messages that are important to make the FDI pages useful to a company interested in the area. These are: