São Paulo – Six Arab buyers joined in for the 10th edition of Buyer Project Brasil Auto Parts, a project carried out in tandem by the Brazilian Auto Parts Manufacturers Association (Sindipeças) and the Brazilian Export and Investment Promotion Agency (Apex-Brasil). The buyers sat down for business matchmaking sessions and visited manufacturing plants in São Paulo and Caxias do Sul (RS) in early October.
They were looking to purchase braking systems, electrical systems, transmissions, motors, steering systems, cooling systems and car bodies. Sindipeças said they made immediate deals worth a combined USD 30,000, with an additional USD 300,000 expected to come through in the next twelve months.
Sindipeças adviser Elias Mufarej said the buyers represented auto parts distributors. Two of them are from Egypt and one each is from the UAE, Jordan, Kuwait and Lebanon.
“They were mostly looking for spare parts for automobiles, heavy vehicles and agricultural vehicles. We got a request from the consulate of Egypt in order for Brazilian and Egyptian manufacturers to share commercial information,” the executive said via email.
Mufarej says that buyers – altogether, there were 28, from fifteen countries – stayed three days in São Paulo and two days in Caxias do Sul. In all, 1,150 meetings with 97 Brazilian companies were held, with USD 4.2 million in deals done and more USD 15 million in possible deals in the next twelve months.
The Brazilian auto parts sector exports products to over 180 countries – in 2016, it generated USD 6.5 billion in exports. From this total, USD 70 million were sent to twenty Arab countries, according to a survey conducted by Sindipeças based on data from the Ministry of Industry, Foreign Trade and Services.
According to Mufarej, Arab buyers are always on the association’s focus regarding Automec, the sector’s main expo, and the Buyer Project. The Brasil Auto Parts project is also present every year at Automechanika Dubai, one the main industry shows in the Middle East.
*Translated by Gabriel Pomerancblum & Sérgio Kakitani
