Middle East, 18 May 2010: His Highness Sheikh Saif bin Hamad Al Sharqi, Chairman of Fujairah Free Zone Authority, today inaugurated the Sixth Digital Consumer Channel (DCC) MEA 2010. DCC MEA has firmly established itself as the premier annual event for the Middle East and North African (MENA) retail channel. This year’s event will see a record number of more than 500 registered attendees that cover 63 vendors and over 170 retail executives from MENA region, a 30 percent increase in attendance over 2009.
Farouk Hemraj, CEO of Distree Events, said, “I am really pleased to see the level of support from the region’s consumer IT sector. Our strength and popularity is the unique format of the conference and our commitment to keep it productive and relevant to all our attendees. We have a packed agenda at this year’s event including a powerful keynote speech from a truly world class retail executive now working in the Middle East.”
This year’s DCC MEA introduces the Hospitality Zone. This new area located on the second floor of Le Meridien Al Aqah allows vendors to showcase the latest additions to its product portfolio in their own dedicated space. The Hospitality Zone is different from the traditional ‘exhibition’ hall since they double as private meeting rooms for these key vendors.
In addition, DCC MEA returns with all its regular sessions including Talk Shows where some of the region’s top vendors outline their channel strategy for 2010 and beyond; boardroom sessions from vendors as well as the productive one-on-one meetings that DCC MEA has become renowned for.
This year’s event also features the ‘Middle East Retail Academy (MERA): 2010 Awards’ – a chance to reward excellence across the region’s retail channel. The MERA Awards take place on the evening of 19th May. The awards recognise excellence in the region’s consumer electronics and IT retail channel. A total of 31 awards are up for grabs in 2010 with categories for vendors, retailers and distributors.
On the last day, DCC MEA delegates will have access to some of the region’s leading retail analysts and consultants during the Retail Academy workshop sessions.
The event is supported by Belkin and Intel as Platinum sponsors, Acer, Dell, Genius, Grand Stores, HP and Lenovo as Gold sponsors, and Asbis, Linksys and ProTech as Silver sponsors.
Details on DCC MEA are available on www.dcc-mea.com.
