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Business outlook
Surviving the tough stretch
Covid19 has been declared a pandemic. With many countries closing borders, restricting entry of passengers and goods from infected countries, how will mid-size businesses cope and overcome the challenges. We find out how some Businesses are taking up alternatives.
— By Diksha Vohra
Covid-19 or Coronavirus as it is more commonly known seems to have engulfed the entire world as a threat of a scale never seen in recent decades. Originating in China, it has eventually fanned out across most countries from Italy to Korea and many others being amongst the severely affected. Health comes first and therefore every other aspect of daily lives has been dis-rupted to ensure the damage is contained. Social distancing has been advocated as this is a communicable disease, spread from person to person contact. In this context business survival seems to be quite a steep mountain to climb. While Business in the worst and locked down zones of some of the countries globally is almost at a standstill, even in SmartSMB / March 2020
in countries that have seen only moderate numbers of infected residents, Business has slowed down. The global supply chain is disrupted and workforce of companies are increasingly working remotely. With borders being closed and flights reduced to several countries, from airlines to logistics to trade, all businesses seem to have felt the impact overtly. But is the situation that intense in the UAE? “Due to the delay in operation of factories in China, the delivery of goods for projects have been delayed,” says Ajay Awtaney, Managing Director, Nakashi General Trading LLC. “It has become difficult to cater to every new enquiry as
not all projects can accept increased lead times.” Especially for B2B clients, the effect would be felt throughout the supply chain because if one’s trade stops, the other’s stops too. Thomas Gregory, Executive Director & Partner, Fusion Specialised Shipping & Logistics LLC, says that usually during the first quarter, the market is anyway low in comparison to last few years. “Much to our surprise, we didn’t see a major slump compared to 2019 or even 2018. This stems from the fact that business is always at its low in the first quarter considering the New Year followed by the Chinese New Year and associated holidays. The virus spread happened during this low period and the
