Pirouzan Parvine, a partner in the global law firm Dentons who was involved in advising France’s Accor SA in building hotels in Iran, says a key is to negotiate with regard to Iranian customs.
“What’s happening around the Iranian negotiating table? Tea, coffee, cake, fruit, maybe some kebab before another coffee,” he told the Geneva conference, with hundreds of European companies attending. "On the Iranian side, we have to explain how business is done through intermediaries.”
Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, who has the final say on all affairs of the state, has called for boosting domestic production, along with increased competitiveness and efficiency. While that offers Rouhani political cover to forge more liberal economic policies, it also seeks to ease the concerns of conservatives who oppose widespread foreign ownership.
“There are a lot of opportunities in Iran,” Giulio Haas, Swiss Ambassador to Iran, speaking at the conference at the Kempinski Hotel on Lake Geneva. “You will have to go after them cautiously. But Iran is a country that wants to develop. This is not a basket of gangsters, it is a BRIC in the making.”