CEOs of The Coca Cola Company, Nestlé, Tesco, Alibaba and more of the word’s leading FMCG’s are meeting in Cape Town in June this year for a Global Summit Consumer Goods Summit.
The CEO’s are meeting to discuss the disruption that is ravaging the their businesses as technology driven startups set up business models that could potentially render them moribund in the next few years. They are seeing what has happened to traditional brick and mortar shopping outlets and want to avoid a similar fate. Interestingly, they are meeting with the very disruptors that are in someway more of value partners than direct competition.
According to a press release sent to Nairametrics, the theme of this year’s Global Summit is ‘Seizing opportunities in the face of disruption’. Delegates and speakers will span the entire consumer goods ecosystem including retailers, manufacturers, service providers and trade associations. The Global Summit, which has become the industry’s most significant annual event, celebrates its 60th anniversary this year.
This year the line-up of speakers will serve to bridge the industry generation gap and will feature both legacy heavy-hitters such as Coca Cola Company CEO and Chairman Muhtar Kent, Tesco CEO Dave Lewis and Daniel Zhang, CEO of Alibaba, as well as a new generation of young entrepreneurs making waves of their own in the industry, including the CEO of Facebook Africa, Nunu Ntshingila and Affiong Williams, founder and CEO of ReelFruit, an emerging fruit processing company.
According to organizers, the Global Summit will focus on disruption in all areas of business, and the resultant opportunities. Innovators, CEOs and leaders of new business models from both emerging and developed markets will come together to challenge delegates to see disruption from new vantage points.
It’s an interesting meeting considering the pace at which small businesses have leveled the barrier to entry in the FMCG market introducing a menacing competition that had hit top line revenue growth. With two of the largest African Economies in economic turmoil buyers are more price conscious preferring value products, large FMCG companies will have to find creative ways to cut cost while maintaining price points.
