Magento is a well known eCommerce platform that has been through a lot of change recently.
Once a truly open-source offer, with a strong community element, the commerce solution has been owned by Ebay, private equity and now Adobe. Despite the changes in ownership, the community element of Magento remains, and one of the quirks of that community is a series of events around the world called ‘Meet Magento’.
This week, for the first time, the ‘Meet Magento’ event will be held in Dubai. Magento is a popular choice for retailers in the region. It offers a good level of ‘out of the box’ features which include multi-language and multi-currency capability.
While the focus has shifted to the ‘Enterprise’ version of the software, there is still an ‘entry level’ option which works well for retailers who are starting their online channel development – something that is still a feature of the Middle East market.
Many of the region’s eCommerce success stories are built on Magento – from Mumzworld to Ounass, but despite this, only a small number of Magento ‘ecosystem’ companies have chosen to take the risk on this market and invest in the region.
While there is still a large opportunity to unlock online shopping growth in places like Saudi Arabia, there are still significant challenges – challenges that may make S.E. Asia more attractive as a place to do business.
Meet Magento Dubai will be an interesting insight into the state of eCommerce in the region. Companies like Algolia and ShipperHQ which augment the basic Magento product will get to see if there is an appetite here for their offers.
System integrators like Redbox Digital (who is hosting the event), Vaimo and Astound Commerce – all of whom have had varied success in the region, will get to see the extent of the Magento community in the region and be able to measure where to invest next.
The event begins on September 3rd with separate tracks for merchants and developers. Aquitude’s Head of Digital, David Fuller will moderate a panel on day one exploring the impact of digital platforms on retail over the past few years and looking ahead to the future.
And, you can read out thoughts post event here! The hashtag for the event is #MM18AE