IBCCIM Trade & Investment IT Mission in London

Martin Johnston writes from London:

In February the British-Iranian Chamber of Commerce (BICC) welcomed to London an Irano-British Chamber of Commerce, Industries and Mines IT Mission from Iran. The Mission arrived on 9th of February and was in London for four days and was led by Dr Amini, the Vice president and Secretary General of IBCCIM.

In fact the UK is a good place for the Iranian IT industry to extend its international links. The UK is the world's third largest consumer of computer services, accounting for 6.9% of the global market. It is a fast growing market (5.4% in 2004) and is forecast to continue to be so. The software and computer services sector comprises almost 130,000 companies. The UK is known for strong research and innovation in the IT sector: one example being the World Wide Web Consortium, foundered by a British national, Tim Bemers-Lee, in 1994. Structurally the UK has a strong ICT innovation supply chain, running from the academic community through SME developers, then application integrators, leading to the end user.

The Mission and its programme

The Mission included Iranian companies involved in software, networking, telecommunications, data capture and transfer, bar-coding, electronic payments, hardware manufacture and distribution and IT consultancy. The companies wanted to meet UK suppliers and consultants, identify sales opportunities and joint-venture investment partners, and to visit an exhibition. They were largely able to this.

One day was spent at the Legal IT Exhibition in London and another day the party made a factory visit to Hi-grade Computers Pic (saibip@higrade.com ), UK manufacturers of desktops, notebooks and servers which recently opened an office in Tehran.

On another day there was a programme of seven talks and discussion from:
• John Davies, ICT Specialist Adviser to UK Trade and Investment, part of the Department of Trade and Industry, (mindsite@btintemet.com) who provided an overview of the UK IT market
• Dr Fahhang Daemi, Farda Ltd (daemi@farda.co.uk) who talked about Visualisation Sensor Technology
• Majid Jahanshahi (maiid@iahanshahi.co.uk) who talked of his long experience of contracting with IT companies in the UK
• Tim Hallac, mabox, (tim@mabox.co.uk) who explained how his marketing agency helps overseas technology companies market services in the UK and Europe
• Dr Shahram Tajbaksh and Dr Min-Joong Kim, Blue Sky Telecoms Solutions Ltd (shah@bstsolutions.co.uk) who offer telecom solutions to enterprises in all market sectors
• Ashkar Sheibani, Comtek Network Systems (info@comtek.co.uk) which provides network hardware refurbishments for sale
• Gary Adams, Oscel Technologies, (gary.adams@oscel.com) who develops websites, intranets, extranets and information management systems

Prospects of improving IT trade

There are at least two reasons to believe there could be a growing IT trade/investment relationship between the UK and Iran. Firstly Broadband penetration in Iran is expected to grow significantly in 2005 and continue to grow thereafter. This is important because increasingly IT solutions depend on wide band widths.

Secondly, among the 130,000 UK software companies, an important number are owned and run by British Iranians, people who are familiar with the UK IT industry but also, of course, with the industry in Iran. These people and their companies could act as the bridge for developing business in the sector.

There was also discussion of whether Iran could be the recipient of software and processing work out-sourced from the UK. It was argued that, in the high level of education and the existing IT industry, there was the precondition for it. Also work had already been out-sourced from the UK motor industry to Iranian companies. However it was concluded that the cost of marketing outsourcing work on a general scale is too expensive for one company alone, rather it will need to be promoted on a sector basis.

Finding a UK partner

The size, complexity and specialization of the UK IT industry means that Iranian companies will need to be clear about their partnering strategy and be prepared to commit time and effort to finding a partner. They will need to:

• Understand their own strength and weaknesses, particularly where these will be relevant to a potential partner
• Establish the type of partner being sought
• Understand and research the UK market
• Visit the UK to develop relationships
• Build a win/win scenario for partners and build trust relationships
• Ensure technology protections
• Enter a Non Disclosure Agreement
• Ensure that the UK partner visits Iran and becomes familiar with the country
• Set realistic expectations; it normally takes 12-24 months to build a business partnership

Building a partnership in the UK

Where Iranian companies come in mission groups to the UK, BICC, with inputs from the Department of Trade and Industry, through UKTI, may be able to help in finding matches with British IT companies where the requirements of visiting companies are specific enough. In addition, the BICC Board has decided to establish whether its IT Members can provide the nucleus of a group for promoting IT trade and investment between the two countries and we will be working with IBCCIM in this.

As you can see, the IT Mission from Iran stimulated discussion and thinking. Let us see how far we can go!