Amer Bitar on how the Licensing Horizons conference helps brands scale in the Middle East

Amer, it’s great to connect. Your Licensing Horizons events are pitched as the Middle East’s premier licensing conferences, focused on sharing insights around how to scale IP successfully in the Middle East and North Africa. How did this all come about?
Around three years ago, I teamed up with Phillipe Guinaudeau – the CEO of BrandTrends, a big company that does lots of reports for brands globally – around this idea for a B2B event in the Middle East… Because there was nothing in the region.

We discussed it with Licensing International, and they agreed to support it, so we hosted the first event in Dubai back in 2023. It was a small but successful one-day conference. We invited a few people to speak and facilitated networking between global brands and executives. And now it’s an annual event in Dubai that focuses on the Middle East.

And last year saw you launch a second event in Saudi Arabia?
Yes, we had started to get more interest in the Saudi market, which is a bit different to Dubai. So last year we launched a Licensing Horizons event in Saudi, just focused on the Saudi market. It took place in Riyadh and was very successful. We want to do more, and find more ways to help local brands, especially in Saudi, to go global. As an event I think it has lots of potential.

Very exciting. And does this feed into the activity around Vision 2030 – the Saudi government initiative that looks to diversify the country’s economy, society and culture?
Yes, lots of big brands now are coming to Saudi to invest – especially now the infrastructure is being built to support different events and initiatives. It’s the same across the wider region – Disney is launching a park in Abu Dhabi. So there’s lots of potential there – we just need to educate local industry about the power of licensing and how they can grow their business through licensing.

Would you like to see more creative agencies attend Licensing Horizons?
Absolutely. Look at Dubai, it is home to lots of big media creative agencies. And they do need to cultivate their own local talent, but there’s exciting opportunities for creatives to engage with the region. And it’s important that creative for this region is authentic. The Bedouin culture is so strong, so we need to get that culture into the creative for this region. designs. But yes, we would love more creative agencies to attend the event as there’s lots of projects happening and opportunities in the region for them to engage with.

You mentioned Bedouin culture there. What are some of the other key differences around how licensing works in the Middle East compared to in Europe or the US?
It’s different, but Saudis love brands – and the Middle East is very much connected to what is going on around the world trend-wise, especially in Europe. That said, you need to adapt to the different culture. For example, the Middle East is very much a relationship culture – work between two parties is built on trust… Contracts don’t have any value if the trust isn’t there. This is so important to understand for brands coming from the West. This is part of what we’re trying to do with Licensing Horizons – educate global companies on how to work in the region.

Great. And when is the next event?
Our next Licensing Horizons Dubai takes place on March 24th. Anyone that would like to have a chat with me about that can reach me at [email protected]. We will also soon announce the next Riyadh event, which will take place around October.

And Amer, to wrap up, how did you find your way into licensing?
Yes, in 2006 I joined Spacetoon Kids TV – one of the largest kids’ media groups at that time in the Middle East. I moved to Dubai to head up that operation, handling growing content monetization, licensing among other things. Then I moved to a Japanese agency called Animation International – I established their operation in the Middle East, Turkey, and Pakistan at that time. I worked with them to introduce brands like Captain Tsubasa and Doraemon to the region. Then I joined WWE – so a big shift to sports entertainment. We signed a big deal with Saudi during that time and I think WWE was one of the first entertainment brands to become part of the Vision 2030 initiative there.

In 2022, I started an agency called Markettcom and we worked with brands like the Met, TGI Fridays and a few other brands. Earlier this year, I sold it to my partner and an investment firm who acquired it, so I started again with BBM Licensing, a brand management and licensing agency.

Also, I do research around brands. There’s a project we started two years ago called The Authenticity Formula with a researcher based in Germany called John Lam. We are working on a book that soon will be published by Palgrave Macmillan this summer. It’s about how to keep brands authentic when they move into another culture.

We’ll keep an eye out for that. Thanks again Amer.