Exceeding Expectations

Jason Ou, Managing Director of Hisense Middle East and North Africa on the brand's vision for success in the GCC region

Hisense is a leading multinational consumer electronic and white goods manufacturer, founded in 1969 and headquartered in Qingdao, Shandong Province, China. The company has subsidiaries that include two listed companies, Hisense Electric and Hisense Kelon Electrical listed in Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hong Kong and has acquired many known brands including Toshiba, Gorenje, Kelon and Ronshen.

Talking about the company’s presence in the Middle East, Jason Ou, Managing Director, Middle East and North Africa said that in order to expand its business and increase brand visibility globally, Hisense started its business penetration into overseas market in late 2012, setting-up its Middle East office in the UAE. Within just a few years, Hisense ME has achieved remarkable growth in the region and has successfully built a multi-million-dollar business.

In the Middle East region, Hisense offers a broad range of technology driven products that are manufactured and distributed across the world, including smart TVs, home appliances like refrigerators, washing machines, freezers, and air conditioners, among other products, ideal for today’s smart living, with designs to meet even the most demanding users.

The premium range includes — an extravagant 100-inch 4K HDR Laser TV, designed for unparalleled cinema-like immersive viewing in the comfort of one’s personal or business space supported with green and eco-friendly technologies. It is equipped with enhanced spectrum of colour that shows true-to-life images with the precision of its laser light source. The MEMC Technology with microsecond-level response makes it ideal for uninterrupted viewing and Dolby ATMOS technologies provides a superior audio quality. Additionally, to keep it more ‘eye-friendly’, Laser TV has acquired Germany TÜV Rheinland ‘low blue light eye protection certification’ that makes one’s eyes more comfortable during over prolonged watch times. Most importantly, Laser TV comes with a customisable feature — only available in the ME region — that transforms the TV into a large scenic frame looking like an artistic wall piece.

Gorenje, a high-quality and intelligently designed home appliance brand that provides smart and efficient products with high performance and low energy consumption, is another well-known European brand that comes under the Hisense umbrella.

Core values

Ou said that Hisense’s core values are integrity, innovation, customer focus and sustainability. He further added that the brand has delivered supreme quality electronics, excellent after-sales and customer services as well as reassurance of its comprehensive warranties, for over 50 years.

Speaking about the shared values of the company, Ou said that there is a combined goal as a team to become the most trusted company in the consumer electronics and home appliance industry and from top to bottom, the whole company makes it their mission to improve consumers’ lives and add value to partners, by developing high-quality, innovative and affordable products, whilst also committing to exceeding expectations and delivering great results across the globe.

In this regard, Ou said that Hisense has recently been honoured with the prestigious consumer-friendly business certificate by the Department of Economic Development. This award, he added, is an excellent initiative for brands to intensify their competitiveness and to motivate them to keep connecting with the consumers. Having said that, Ou said that Hisense looks forward to introducing additional effective processes and services to ensure the best-in-class service is available for its customers.

Venture in the GCC

On the subject of penetrating the Middle East region, Ou said that the consumer electronics market in the GCC region has been booming with many new attractions, projects and easing of foreign investments, bringing in more people from across the globe to the UAE.

The UAE market in particular has a good growth potential due to consumer purchasing power, high product and technology awareness, as well as an increasing demand for innovative, smart and affordable electronics. With Vision 2021 and Expo 2020, the UAE has been successfully positioned as a land of innovation and being a hub of technological advancements; we see a huge potential for the brand to be a part of the dynamic changes in the digital and technological spere that will aid in further growth of the brand and reinforce the brand presence in the market.

He said that Hisense is glad to have partnered with Al Futtaim Electronics, one of the region’s major players in the consumer electronics distribution within the UAE as well as the overall GCC region. He went on to say that through this partnership, the company looks forward to reinforcing and leveraging each other’s strengths to further expand and consolidate the TV business in the UAE’s IR market.

Al Futtaim Electronics is a natural choice for Hisense to partner with in order to enhance its presence in the UAE IR markets. Ou said that the brand’s unique capabilities and proficiency in operating full-fledged distribution, warehousing, and after-sales services, along with its comprehensive distribution network within the IR market makes them an invaluable partner for Hisense’s TV IR distribution.

He is of the view that the partnership will enable Hisense to facilitate the estimated growth of 50 per cent by 2022 in the UAE market as both companies share the same visions to expand their business footprints and solidify their market positions.

He said that over the years, Hisense has been aggressively enhancing its brand awareness through global sports sponsorships such as the Euro Cup — in 2016 and 2020— Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), FIFA World Cup (2018) and continuing the brand’s sports marketing momentum, Hisense has recently announced its sponsorship of FIFA World Cup 2022. This will in turn help both of the brands to leverage these assets and consolidate their position in the UAE TV market.

— ali@khaleejtimes.com