Bill Gates Invited to Attend Forum on Business and Technology in Tunisia

The Kram Exhibition Park will be hosting the Forum of Business and Technology, also known as CAT 2012, from November 28 to 30.

This summit is organized by the Agency for Promotion of Industry (API) and is expected to attract 15,000 professional visitors, 1,000 foreign businessmen, and 500 exhibitors that include 300 Tunisian industrial companies. The program, with a budget of 1.6 million Tunisian dinars ($1 million), is expected to generate over 1,000 meetings between businesses to spur collaborations.

President and General Manager of API Mohamed Ferid Tounsi, in an interview with Express FM , said that this international event will be presided over by Prime Minister Hamadi Jebali.

The creation of more job opportunities through the establishment of small and medium enterprises, he said, will be the main purpose of this event.

The forum will focus on the sectors characterized by the fastest growth, such as information and communication technologies (ICT), pharmaceuticals, food processing, mechanical industries, and electronics.

Salem Bouarada, Central Director of API, underlined his expectation for this summit, “One of our goals is to attract 1,000 foreign investors by which we attract 10,000 professionals from the world of investments (…) to help enhance our economy.”

Tounsi elaborated on the potential presence of rumored guest Bill Gates, “For this opportunity, we invited international business personalities like Bill Gates, the CEO of Airbus, and the CEO of Samsung to create a buzz in Tunisia.”

The visit of Gates would be his second to North Africa after visiting Cairo, Egypt, in 2005 and one of numerous visits to the African continent on behalf of The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.

On the sidelines of this event, part of the exhibition park’s 40 thousand square meters of open space will be dedicated for “the great debate,” as API calls it, in which Airbus CEO, Samsung CEO, and Gates will publicly discuss industrialization in Tunisia.

Gates left his position as CEO of Microsoft in 2008 and has since remained its chairman. In 2007, Steve Ballmer, current CEO of Microsoft, made a controversial visit to Tunisia in which awarded former Tunisian President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali for worldwide leadership in ICT.