ROEI™ framework
Companies do not fail because incorporation is expensive.
They fail because they spend in the wrong order.
Unpartnered UAE entry often burns a mid-six to seven figure sum — trips, a premature entity,
a distributor that does not sell — and a year or two before the first real invoice.
ROEI™ asks a simpler question than IRR: what did you spend before you knew the market was real.
Return on Expansion Investment is a sequencing metric.
It is not a promise that Discovery will recover a million pounds.
It is how we decide whether the next dirham belongs in proof or in concrete.
What the matrix looks at
Capital efficiency
Time to first revenue. Capital committed before validation. Fixed cost versus variable cost on the way in.
Execution confidence
How much of the case is still an assumption. Demand that has been tested versus demand that has been declared.
Commercial readiness
Pilots, price, channel. Whether a go-to-market exists in the UAE, not only in the home market.
What it is not
Not a credit score for FDI
A high reading does not authorize a factory. A low reading does not forbid the UAE. It tells you where the file is weak.
Not a substitute for Discovery
The engine is a five-minute read. Discovery is the paid file. Do not confuse a diagnostic with work.
How to use it
Run the engine if you want a first cut.
If the sequence looks wrong, stop spending on entity and office.
Then buy Discovery — AED 15,000 — and put numbers on a real file.