Egypt’s economy has long relied on the Suez Canal, tourism and money sent home by workers abroad. That picture is changing. Some of the country’s fastest-growing exports are not shipped through a port at all. They are built by Egyptian engineers and delivered digitally to clients around the world.
“Egypt is competing more and more on the basis of expertise, innovation and engineering excellence, rather than cost alone,” says Hany Girgis, CEO and managing partner of the Deloitte Innovation Hub. He notes that every project delivered from Cairo adds to this shift.
Egypt continues to strengthen its position on the global stage. Tourism is reaching record levels and the country is expanding its presence across sectors ranging from sports to technology. This reflects a broader shift in how global competitiveness is defined. Countries no longer compete solely on natural resources, manufacturing capabilities or labor costs. Leadership is increasingly measured by the ability to develop advanced technologies, engineer sophisticated digital solutions and build the talent needed to solve tomorrow’s business challenges.
A Sector on the Rise
The Information and Communications Technology sector is a major driver of this change. It is growing at roughly 16% a year and is expected to make up 8% of Egypt’s GDP by 2030. The market could top US$53 billion by then. In 2025, Egypt was named “Outsourcing Delivery Destination of the Year” at the Global Sourcing Association Awards in the UK.
Egypt’s workforce backs up this growth. More than 60% of the population is under 30. Over 50,000 IT graduates join the job market every year. The Ministry of Justice and the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology have also rolled out digital justice platforms, building secure infrastructure that supports advanced technology like artificial intelligence.
This groundwork helped bring Deloitte to Cairo. The firm reviewed 43 cities before choosing the Egyptian capital as home to its Innovation Center. “The objective was not to establish a traditional support services center, but rather to make a strategic investment in Egypt’s potential to become a regional hub for innovation and engineering excellence,” Girgis explains.
Growth Built on People
Since launching in 2023, the center has grown from 23 staff to nearly 1,000 engineers, developers, and AI specialists. Deloitte backed it with an initial US$30 million investment, followed by another US$80 million in 2025 to be spent over three years. The team now works on artificial intelligence, cloud engineering, cybersecurity and customer experience projects for global clients.
The center’s multidisciplinary teams help organizations tackle complex business challenges through generative AI, cloud-native software engineering, cyber resilience, enterprise platforms, and intelligent automation, turning strategies into tangible business outcomes. As a Google Cloud AI Experience Center, the Deloitte Innovation Center also allows organizations to explore and deploy advanced technologies that accelerate innovation and create real value.
Technology alone does not drive economic transformation, Girgis notes. People are at the heart of it. Every engineer, developer and data specialist who gets the chance to work on world-class projects from Cairo helps strengthen Egypt’s international competitiveness. For the Deloitte Innovation Center, investing in human talent has always mattered as much as investing in technology.
The center runs “NextStep,” a mentorship program that recently partnered with UNICEF Egypt to help young professionals build global careers without leaving home.
For years, retaining top talent was one of Egypt’s biggest challenges. That picture is changing. Egyptian engineers increasingly get to solve complex global problems, work with international clients and take part in major transformation programs while staying based in Egypt.
Deloitte has since launched its Europe, Middle East and Africa region, linking 132,000 professionals in more than 80 countries. For Cairo’s engineers, this opens the door to major regional projects without having to leave home.
Egypt’s next generation of exports will not be measured only by what crosses physical borders, but by the ideas, innovation and engineering excellence the country produces. Investing in talent, technology and digital infrastructure is one of the key ways Egypt can strengthen its position in the global economy.
“The progress Egypt has made, and the growing confidence that global institutions place in its talent, indicate that this future is no longer a distant ambition,” Girgis says. “It is already taking shape on the ground.”
