New e-commerce platform Noon.com, which was due to launch in January this year, has appointed Faraz Khalid as its chief executive officer, the company said in a statement on Monday.
Khalid is the former co-founder and managing director of Middle East online fashion retailer Namshi.
Dubai-based Emaar Malls, the shopping malls and retail business division of Emaar Properties, announced in May it will acquire a 51 percent stake in Namshi for $151 million.
Dubai billionaire Mohamed Alabbar is the founder of Noon, as well as the founder and chairman of Emaar Properties.
Alabbar announced in November last year that the $1 billion Noon shopping portal was due to launch in January 2017.
Noon has since been beset with teething problems, including the departure of its former CEO Fodhil Benturquia and other senior staff.
In May, a fund led by Alabbar acquired United Arab Emirates-founded online marketplace JadoPado.
Noon subsequently appointed JadoPado founder Omar Kassim as chief technology officer, but he “stepped down” from the role just days later.
“Due to the shift in our operational base and the need for even greater efficiencies, there have been nominal staff reallocations and changes,” a Noon spokesman told Reuters in May, without being specific.
Alabbar said on Monday that Noon was “on track” to launch this year with final work on its fulfilment infrastructure and payment systems being completed. “Several of the region’s leading brand owners and suppliers have come on board, underlining our local strength,” he said in a statement.
He also said he was confident that Noon’s new CEO Khalid would “deliver an e-commerce platform like no other in the region”.
“Faraz has built a successful e-commerce business in the region, and brings the right domain experience and market knowledge to his role as Noon’s chief executive officer,” he added.
Khalid holds an MBA from The Wharton School and has played an instrumental role in the success of Namshi, which was launched in 2012, and built the region’s largest fashion catalogue with over 700 international brands, the statement said.
Noon is a $1 billion joint venture between Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund and a group of prominent gulf investors. Alabbar said last year that Noon.com would offer 20 million products, including technology, fashion, toys and books.
Alabbar’s acquisitions came soon after American e-commerce giant Amazon beat his $800 million bid to acquire regional shopping website Souq.com, which advisor Goldman Sachs told Reuter was “the biggest-ever technology M&A transaction in the Arab world”.
Meanwhile, Amazon is gearing up for its entry into the Gulf markets as it begins hiring in the region. In a job posting on LinkedIn last month, Amazon said it was looking for a ‘Manager, International Public Policy’ in the Middle East, and also invited candidates to connect with the company for “general consideration”.
Global consultancy A.T. Kearney said the Gulf region's e-commerce market is expected to grow to $20 billion by 2020, according to a report published last year.
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