The UAE market entry checklist: 20 questions before you commit

A trade licence can be issued in days. Whether the UAE is the right market, at the right price, through the right route, takes longer to answer, and those answers decide whether the entry pays back. This checklist sets out the 20 questions we work through with companies before they commit capital, in five groups.

Demand

1. Who exactly will buy, and how many of them are there in the UAE today?
2. How do they buy now, and what would make them switch?
3. Is demand concentrated in one emirate, one segment or a handful of large customers?
4. Is the market growing, and what is driving that growth?

Pricing

5. What do comparable products or services sell for, and through which channels?
6. Can we hold our home-market price, or will we need to position differently?
7. What margins do distributors, agents or retailers expect?
8. How sensitive are buyers to price compared with brand, service or availability?

Competition

9. Who are the established players, local and international, and how do they win?
10. Where are they weak: segments underserved, service gaps, slow delivery?
11. How would they respond to a new entrant?
12. What would make a customer choose us over them, in their words rather than ours?

Route to market

13. Should we sell directly, through a distributor or agent, or through a partner?
14. Which licence and legal structure fits that route, mainland or free zone, and what does each allow us to do?
15. Which regulatory approvals, registrations or certifications do our products need, and how long do they take?
16. Do we need a physical presence from day one, and where?

The financial case

17. What will entry cost in total, including licences, people, premises, marketing and working capital?
18. How long until revenue covers running costs, under realistic and cautious assumptions?
19. What is the downside if demand comes in slower or prices lower than planned?
20. At what point, and on what evidence, would we decide to stop or change course?

Using the checklist

Most companies can answer some of these from their own knowledge. The ones that need outside evidence are usually 2, 8, 12 and 18, because they depend on what customers and the market actually do rather than what the company expects. For a deeper look at the five questions that matter most, read UAE market entry: five questions to answer before you commit.

In practice: for a weight-loss company entering the UAE, our work went beyond answering these questions. The potential business partners we had interviewed during the primary research became a shortlist the company could act on. That let it make quick moves within its first three months and keep its initial investment to a minimum.

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