For years, it was easy to caricature China’s economic footprint in Egypt: Door-to-door saleswomen in residential buildings (“Do you want to buy Chinese products?”) juxtaposed with containers of cheap, low-quality goods. That’s changing: Chinese manufacturers are world-leading, and Beijing’s outward investment model is growing more sophisticated as even local governments now have targets to encourage companies in their areas to expand abroad.

Egypt’s approach to industrial and investment policy is shifting just as a more sophisticated wave of Chinese capital is hitting our shores. As Investment and Foreign Trade Minister Hassan El Khatib made clear at our EnterpriseAM Egypt Forum last month, Egypt has drawn a firm line between dumping and economic growth.

What do we want? El Khatib wants Chinese companies to build, hire, and export from here — with an emphasis on value-added manufacturing, not using Egypt as a backdoor to Western markets. The UAE made the same point last week when it imposed its own anti-dumping measures, declaring it wouldn’t be a transit point for re-exports to Europe or the United States.

We’re not alone in courting more Chinese investment — the UAE and Saudi want a share, too. That brought HSBC China Deputy CEO Ed Weeks and a group of senior Chinese bankers on a tour through all three last week to explore the MENA opportunity. We caught up with Weeks in Cairo for a sit-down that revealed a lot of common ground between China’s playbook and Egypt’s new ambitions.

The moment may be right: Our push to move up the value chain comes as China works to keep alive the post-World War Two system of open trade — it is, after all, the system on which its entire economy is predicated. With protectionism rising, the key for many Chinese companies is to anchor production networks more deeply in other countries to preserve market access and competitiveness. That drive could help reshape trade corridors across the Arab world.

From “Made *in* China” to “Made *by* China”: The early 2000s were about China exporting surplus capacity, while the 2010s were about assembly hubs and low-cost factory floors. Today, it’s about what Weeks calls “China outbound 3.0. It’s about moving beyond in-country manufacturing and processing to a more subtle, more sophisticated approach involving ecosystems and supply chains.” Chinese companies are chasing something more permanent — integration, technology, and local ecosystems, he says: “It’s moved from Made in China to Made by China … Chinese brands not just being cost efficient, but being of value and high quality.”

Longtime EnterpriseAM readers have seen that evolution from Upper Egypt to Ain Sokhna. Solar PV manufacturers are expanding service capacity rather than just shipping panels. Chinese white-goods makers are producing locally (Haier is already on the ground). Anyone who has driven Cairo’s streets or the Wadi Natrun Highway has seen the boom in Chinese EVs and petrol-powered cars on the road. And a major garment player recently chose Egypt as a base for which to produce for one of the world’s largest sportswear brands.

Consumer goods are just the beginning: In the Suez Canal Economic Zone, Jushi, one of the world’s largest fiberglass producers, now runs multiple production lines with a capacity of more than 300k tons a year. Sailun Group is building a USD 1 bn tire manufacturing plant that will produce more than 10 mn tires each year, with operations set to begin next year. China Energy has said it will invest USD 1 bn over five years to expand renewable energy, desalination, and energy storage infrastructure. Cairo is its regional hub. GAC Automotive’s president, meanwhile, said the company will invest up to USD 300 mn in a car plant, while Oppo, Midea, and ZTE are all in Egypt.

(The automotive opportunity is particularly striking: Weeks suggests that while Japanese auto manufacturers produce roughly 70% of their cars outside Japan and the Germans 50%, the comparable figure for China is on the order of just 10-20%. Chinese vehicles, friends, are here to stay.)

By the numbers: There are more than 2.8k Chinese companies operating in Egypt with investments worth more than USD 8 bn, according to GAFI, covering everything from handsets to heavy industry.

The key, if you’re Hassan El Khatib: These companies are embedding supply chains and training local workforces as they build ecosystems, not inventory to dump on the local (or other proximal) market. It’s a shift from assembly to industrial-scale production, much of it for export.

Policy stability and a can-do mentality in many corners of government have made Egypt a lot more attractive to foreign investors — and, of course, it’s now more cost efficient to manufacture here than it is in Turkey or even India. Todd Wilcox, CEO of HSBC Egypt, says the tide has turned this year: “We’re getting long-term foreign direct investment now. The one thing about the Chinese clients: When they decide, they go. They move. They don’t kick the tires.”

Both Weeks and Wilcox give the Madbouly government credit: Industrial zones such as TEDA in Ain Sokhna and the SCZone have matured from vague headlines into real ecosystems. HSBC thinks the SCZone stands out, with some 180 businesses having attracted investment of c. USD 3 bn, creating nearly 10k jobs. And Weeks says the team at TEDA is unusually hands-on — partners rather than landlords. “There’s a sense of ‘guardianship’ to it — that if you need doors opened or have a problem, they’re there to help you with that.”

TEDA isn’t alone: GAFI has launched a China desk to smooth communication between investors and regulators. (HSBC also launched a China desk a few years back to support Chinese businesses here and was the first bank in the country to launch RMB transactions in Egypt.)

Bureaucracy is still a challenge, Wilcox says, but no longer an intractable one. “You can have the right policy, but the implementation of the policies takes time. There’s no magic wand … but encouragingly, [officials] are making headway.”

Wilcox points to tangible progress including streamlined customs procedures, faster land allocation, and shorter licensing times. (The progress on customs clearance is impressive: It’s down to 5.8 days so far this year from 14 days — and El Khatib aims to bring it down to “hours,” he told us earlier this month.)

Policymakers are getting more right than they have in any time since the Nazif era, which saw business leaders and technocrats including Rachid Mohamed Rachid, Mahmoud Mohieldin, Youssef Boutros-Ghali, and others overhauling the bureaucracy.

The business community, which occasionally seems to like little more than to search for a cloud in a silver lining, is taking notice. “I was recently at an AmCham meeting. More than 20 corporates there — American, Saudi, Emirati. All around the table, they were positive on Egypt — really positive on growth, just as they were at the EnterpriseAM event. Everyone is looking forward to a strong 2026 and beyond. We seem to be in a sweet spot right now,” Wilcox said.

Weeks likes to talk about “China speed” — the ability to move from decision to execution almost overnight. “My colleagues in China talk about it a lot — you want to do something, people lean in and we get it done fast. I would argue that what I’ve seen here in Egypt suggests there’s been speed here, as well.”

An emerging cultural fit between Egypt’s entrepreneurial streak and China’s execution discipline is part of what’s driving the new corridor. The speed with which land is allocated, factories go up, and exports roll-out would have seemed impossible even three years ago.

“The energy, the momentum, the opportunity. It feels like a moment for the region,” adds Weeks, “and for us.”

And that’s the key: Egypt isn’t the only one of the Big Three MENA players courting Chinese investment — Saudi and the UAE are looking for pieces, too.

At stake is an opportunity worth 10s of bns of USD per year: HSBC sees two-way trade between Asia and the Middle East doubling in the coming decade to USD 1.7 tn by 2035, according to HSBC Global Investment Research. There’s plenty of Chinese investment at stake, too: The bank predicts overseas investment flowing out of China to all destinations could rise by over 50% between 2023 and 2028 — averaging perhaps USD 240 bn per year and hitting a cumulative USD 1.4 tn by the end of that period. Like Egypt, HSBC wants a bigger piece of the pie, which the bank is pursuing through what it calls “corridor businesses” — teams that understand both ends of a supply chain and can move capital, advice, and risk management fluidly between them.

Everyone wants a piece of China, and Chinese companies know it. No longer content to scatter capital across the developing world, Beijing’s companies — state-backed and private alike — are targeting geographies that combine access, logistics, and policy predictability. In our corner of the world, that means Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. “Outward direct investment from China is still small relative to the size of its economy, which isn’t surprising, given its relatively short history of international investment — but the catch-up continues,” Weeks says.

Egypt’s pitch: location and production. Our comparative advantage lies in our ability to manufacture, not just to trade. We have the Suez Canal linking Asia, Africa, and Europe; we’re cheaper as a base of operations than China, India, or Turkey; and our infrastructure is vastly improved from a decade ago. With interlocking networks of trade agreements (including 10% tariff-free access to the US), Egypt offers Chinese producers an attractive hedge against trade headaches and a launchpad for the export of value-added manufactured goods. A large built-in domestic market doesn’t hurt, either. Egypt is still the only country in the region where Chinese outfits can build “Made in MENA by China” supply chains for export.

A good fit: The sectors El Khatib sees as FDI magnets — including renewables, automotive manufacturing, textiles, electronics, white goods, pharma, logistics, healthcare, and education — are all industries “in alignment with the general trends of Chinese outbound investment,” Wilcox notes. “Chinese exports to Egypt were about USD 16.8 bn last year. Metals and fertilisers led the way, but the trade mix is now becoming increasingly technology‑led and capital‑intensive,” he adds.

The UAE’s pitch: connectivity and finance. Dubai and Abu Dhabi want Chinese manufacturers there, sure — but what they really want is Chinese companies to base their regional headquarters in the UAE. Jebel Ali remains the dominant logistics hub, and the UAE’s free zones offer regulatory clarity that Egypt is still working toward. At the same time, Emirati capital is flowing east: Mubadala and ADQ have increased exposure to China’s renewables and EV supply chains, and Dubai-based DP World is expanding partnerships with Chinese port operators. The UAE is positioning itself as the financial and service centre of the China-MENA corridor — a Hong Kong to Egypt’s Shenzhen.

Saudi Arabia’s pitch: scale and policy ambition. Riyadh has made China a pillar of its diversification strategy under Vision 2030. The Public Investment Fund has appetite for Chinese electric vehicles, renewables, and semiconductors — and it’s courting Chinese industrial players to set up in the kingdom’s new economic zones. For Chinese investors, Saudi Arabia offers policy clarity, political stability, and (if foreign investors in public markets come in) deep and robust capital markets — but higher costs and a more nascent manufacturing ecosystem. Riyadh wants to anchor Chinese industry domestically, not just import its capital.

Each plays a different role in China’s “Outbound 3.0” network — and Beijing appears content to invest in all three, meaning it’s less a zero-sum race than it is about a regional ecosystem: Egypt’s factories feed the UAE’s ports and Saudi’s mega-projects. Emirati and Saudi funds, meanwhile, are investing directly in China, buying stakes in the same companies now setting up shop in Ain Sokhna and Jizan.

Taking a long view: Weeks has spent nearly two decades in Asia — he has the last job Wilcox had before the latter moved to Cairo — and what strikes him most about China is its patience. “Whatever they’re doing, it’s 50 years … long-term views, not just the quarterly numbers. China is ready to deepen cooperation with Egypt in fields including economic and social construction, the import of more high-quality products, and by encouraging more Chinese enterprises to invest here.”

That quiet confidence — of planning in decades, not quarters — is what Egypt now has to emulate. Policy stability and bureaucratic discipline, not just investor enthusiasm, will determine whether 2026 is a pivot point or another lost opportunity.

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