Good News from Thu, 24 June, 2010:

Finpro opens three new offices in Africa

Lehtikuva / Kimmo Mäntylä One of Finpro’s new project offices will be located in the Egyptian capital city of Cairo.
Finnish foreign trade association Finpro will open three new project offices in Africa in 2010. The goal is to ascertain business potential in Africa from the viewpoint of Finnish companies, as well as networking with local operators.

The new offices will be located in Cairo, Egypt; Nairobi, Kenya and Lagos, Nigeria. In addition to offering services to Finnish companies operating in Egypt, the new Cairo office will also cooperate with Finpro’s Tunisian office on issues concerning North Africa. The new Kenya office will work towards mapping out East African markets, and the Nigerian office towards identifying business potential in West Africa. For the time being most of the customer orders will be implemented from Finpro’s already existing Tunisian and South African trade centres. Finpro works closely together with the Departments of Foreign Affairs in different African countries.

Formerly Finpro’s Regional Manager for India, and previously Finpro’s Senior Consultant in Helsinki, Seppo Keränen has been appointed the Project Manager for Finpro’s African offices.  

– The project offices give direction to the future of Finnish companies operating in Africa: what their possibilities are, and where the market demand lies. We seek to find meeting points between market demands and Finnish expertise. We can already say that the telecom service is strong, just like marine industry. In addition, different infrastructural and construction projects require products and services, says Keränen.

Finpro’s investments in Africa have resulted also in other appointments. The Manager of Finpro’s Hong Kong and Guangzhou trade centre, Esa Rantanen has been appointed as the Head of Finpro’s new Kenyan trade centre in Nairobi.  

Project manager of Finpro’s Global Insight and Strategy unit, Markus Ranne will be responsible for the networking of companies and expert organizations interested in business potential in Africa. Ranne will also be in charge of increasing Africa knowledge in Finland.

The Finnish Ministry of Employment and the Economy will fund 75 per cent of the three offices’ costs in the next two years. The rest will be financed by commissions carried out for companies.

www.finpro.fi


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Comments (3)

Teige Sun 28 August 2011 at 7:30
Well done article that. I'll make sure to use it weilsy.