Vahan Zanoyan

If the very word "econometrics" daunts you or strikes you as forbiddingly dull, it might help to have a chat with Vahan Zanoyan, the Director of the Middle East Economic Service of Wharton Econometric Forecasting Associates. For Mr. Zanoyan is one forecaster who believes that econometrics should be much more than number-crunching.

"You need to have a feel for the area you are analysing," says Mr. Zanoyan. "When you are dealing with the countries of the Middle East, a subjective insight into what is going on can be as important as the numbers."

As a result, Mr. Zanoyan will not overwhelm you with figures if you drop in to talk, but will explain the outlook for such things as trade or investments in a way that even a non-expert can relate to. He will do it in an easy, fluent English, or in Arabic or French—and will even let you have it in Armenian if you really insist.

The "subjective insight" which Mr. Zanoyan gives to his conversation on the Middle East is also reflected in the various reports and studies which flow out of his organization to clients all over the world—and stems from an intimacy with the region on the part of Mr. Zanoyan and others on his staff. Mr. Zanoyan himself has lived in the U.S. only since 1975, when he arrived from his native Lebanon. He remains a Lebanese citizen.

Raking In The Blue Chips

The service that Mr. Zanoyan directs has been in existence less than two years, but it is already making money. The number of clients—who are not called clients but "members," Mr. Zanoyan says—now totals more than 30, and is growing at an average of three or four per month. They include blue-chip names: IBM, General Motors, Chemical Bank, Brown Brothers Harriman, Bank of Tokyo, Arab Banking Corporation, United Arab Shipping, British Petroleum, Standard Oil of Indiana, and many others.

Members receive both "subjective insight" and what Mr. Zanoyan calls "rigorous technical analysis" in the form of weekly situation reports on current issues, quarterly assessments of the energy outlook, semi-annual reports on Middle East economic and political conditions along with medium-term forecasts, and annual long-term forecasts focusing on fundamental trends and structural changes. The members also get special reports on selected topics and access to data banks, and are invited to participate in semiannual conferences with members of the Wharton staff and other regional specialists.

Mr. Zanoyan argues that his is a service which is indispensable to companies that do not have their own in-house specialists on the region—and for those who do, it can be helpful as a "second opinion," or to provide support for the expertise which is already there. "Every organization can have a different interest in the same piece of information," he says. "The in-house specialist takes it, massages it along with his own information, and uses it for his report to management."

Mr. Zanoyan got the idea for the service when he was in Philadelphia with Wharton Econometrics, providing input on the Middle East for its global forecasting division—which was able to treat the Middle East in only a marginal way. "It seemed to me, when I dealt with clients, that they had an insatiable thirst for a lot more detailed information on the Middle East than they were getting," he says. "But when I looked around, all the information and consulting services I knew of appeared to be concentrating on the region's day-to-day business opportunities and on how to do business there. They weren't providing the medium-term information that a typical corporate planner or economist needs." So with the backing of Wharton he set up his Middle East Economic Service as an autonomous unit in Washington, D.C.

On The Run

Mr. Zanoyan's own contribution to the organization includes his management role, marketing and consulting activities—"when someone in the Middle East sneezes, my phone starts ringing"—and a deep involvement in the preparation of the product. He is on the road three or four months a year, and sometimes more. His travel includes not only marketing expeditions, such as a recent three-week trip to Japan, but frequent visits to Middle East countries to keep in touch with local conditions. He is not only a polyglot but a workaholic: "I work 14 or 15 hours per day for seven days a week, and have not had a vacation in five years," he says.

Mr. Zanoyan has been a consultant to the Middle East Research Institute of the University of Pennsylvania and to the Gulf Organization for Industrial Consulting of Doha, Qatar, where he prepared and presented a program for econometric research on the Gulf countries. He did his undergraduate studies at the American University of Beirut, concentrating on the socio-political structure of the Arab Middle East, receiving a B.A. in political science. He carried out advanced graduate work in economics at both the American University of Beirut and the University of Pennsylvania, where he was also an instructor in the economics department.