Egypt’s Minister of Investment and Foreign Trade,Mohamed Farid, held high-level talks in Washington with senior executives from Visa Inc., led by Robert Thompson, Senior Vice President and Global Head of Government Relations, and Caitlin McDonnell, Vice President for International Affairs. The meeting focused on expanding Visa’s investments in Egypt and establishing Cairo as a regional hub for digital innovation.
Discussions included the creation of Egypt’s first TradeTech Sandbox, a regulatory lab designed to harness artificial intelligence in analyzing export data and opening new markets for Egyptian products. The initiative aims to strengthen Egypt’s export competitiveness through advanced technology solutions.
Minister Farid highlighted Egypt’s readiness to attract investments across all sectors, citing recent reforms that digitized non-banking financial services, introduced e-identification, e-KYC, and electronic contracting, and boosted investor participation in the capital market from 25,000 to 350,000 annually within three years. He also outlined plans for specialized financial and technology zones, green data centers leveraging Egypt’s strategic cable infrastructure, and local software development to advance artificial intelligence.
Visa executives praised Egypt’s reform agenda and reaffirmed their commitment to expanding operations, noting that the Cairo office now employs over 130 staff and serves as a regional hub for North Africa, the Levant, and Pakistan. They also reviewed successful initiatives such as the “Citizen Card” in Port Said and the “Digital Villages” program supporting micro-enterprises.
