Archives: Leadership

Mateen is a finance professional with over 25 years experience. He started his career in the UK with KPMG before moving to Deutsche Bank and then ABN AMRO, where he was Finance Director for the private equity arm.

In 2006 he moved to the Middle East and has since been a CFO for various companies in the region, which also included corporate advisory activities covering Africa. His sectoral experience, inter alia, includes infrastructure, industrials and banking. Latterly, he headed up the Dubai office of a global litigation financing firm focusing on NPL recovery for the MENA region.

Mateen holds a Masters in Finance & Economics from the University of Dundee and is a chartered accountant holding fellowships both in the UK and Australia. He also holds a LLM in Arbitration & Dispute Resolution and is a member of the Chartered Institiute of Arbitrators in the UK.

Shakeib has over 30 years of experience in engineering, project management and business consulting with a focus on the energy sector.

He started his career as an engineer at the UK Atomic Energy Authority (Culham) and CERN (Geneva) and later worked at McKinsey (London) and independently as a consultant, advising on technology strategy, organisation design, investment management and private equity.

He subsequently moved to the European Commission (Barcelona) to focus on project management, overseeing the development of infrastructure for ITER, the world’s largest clean energy initiative.

Currently he is Director for Infrastructure at iibGroup, overseeing private equity and project finance for infrastructure development in emerging markets across energy, transport and communications. He is also CEO of the AfriData Technology Park in Djibouti currently being built by iibGroup, with a large-scale data centre as its anchor facility.

Shakeib holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Engineering and a Doctorate in Fusion Technology, from the University of Oxford (UK).

Dina has been in Operation, Administration and HR for over 25 years and worked both in London and Bahrain with extensive travel in Europe and Africa.

Her current position is Director, Administration, Compliance and Human Resources for iibGroup. Having worked at HSBC, Robeco Institutional Asset Management, TAIB Bank and iibGroup, she maintained customer relations and built a clientele of elite in the Gulf.

She has profound understanding of the Middle East, in particular the GCC, with first-hand knowledge of the various cultures and standards rooting from her background as half-British and half-Iraqi with a deep connection to the Levant. She has a proven track record in relationship management of HNWIs, facility management and asset management bundled with senior administrative skills that ensure precise and timely delivery of business activities within any set-up.

Dina is a dynamic, proactive person who thrives on working independently and meticulously and is a determined individual with a high level of commitment and enthusiasm.

Dina holds a degree in International Affairs from the Lebanese American University.

Hussain has over 20 years of experience in telecommunications, across strategy, product development, systems implementation and project management.

He worked for 15 years in development and management of products with telecom operators, including the largest operators in the Middle East, building certified data centre facilities, hosting related products, designing ICT and cloud strategies and developing roadmaps for their implementation.

He also worked for 7 years in financial institutions in the Middle-East, heading the information technology division responsible for building and managing cloud-enabled IT infrastructure and designing data centre facilities meeting the institution’s security, backup and geographical redundancy requirements.

Hussain holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Media Technology from the University of the West of Scotland and certification in multiple data centre specialisations, Amazon Web Services and a range of related professional disciplines.

Maruf has over 30 years of experience with leading multinational and regional commercial banks.

His experience spans diverse functional areas in Wholesale, Consumer/Retail Banking, Treasury, Trade Services and business support areas. Maruf started his career with Standard Chartered where he left as the Head of the Consumer Bank and Acting CEO.

He moved on to American Express as Director, Country Operations, Bahrain and MENA. Following this, he moved to Ajman Bank as the Head of the Retail Bank where he launched multiple products aimed at individuals and SMEs.

As Country Manager of Tab Kazak Bank, he focused on cash and trade solutions for mid-cap entities and Treasury products. Most recently Maruf held the role of Assistant General Manager at Arab National Bank in Riyadh.

Maruf holds a Bachelor’s degree in Economics, Accounting and Finance from the University of Manchester.

Francisco has 10 years of experience covering international commercial flows, treasury and portfolio management.

Previously he was heading business development for Gemcorp Group, developing targeted business relationships with sovereigns, state-owned companies, financial institutions and corporates across sub-Saharan Africa.

Formerly, he managed activities focused on developing trade finance credit, treasury and proprietary investment portfolios for Banco Atlantico (Portugal).

Francisco holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of Lisbon, a master’s degree in Marketing from the ISCTE Business School and post-graduate specialisation in Investments and Financial Markets from the Portuguese School of Bank Management.

Omer has over 2 decades of banking experience in the North American, Asian & Middle Eastern markets with a primary focus towards Global Market Sales and Structuring.

With an extensive background in coverage of Local Markets Fixed Income and Currencies (FIC) businesses with Global Multinationals, Local Corporates and Financial Institutions, Omer has the ability to communicate and work effectively across different cultures and boundaries to deliver results. He has been responsible for delivering on revenue budgets and executing first line of defence towards a strong risk and control environment.

Omer started his banking career in Pakistan and then from 2003 to 2007 he worked with Credit Suisse and Barclays in New York with a primary focus towards FI Derivative Structuring and Structured Repos. Following this, from 2007 to 2021, Omer worked in various roles, at Deutsche Bank in Singapore, London and Dubai, covering Financial Institutions, Supras and Global MNC Corporates for their Emerging Market requirements. Key products included FX, Rate Derivatives and Local Market Financing which covered Episodic as well as Flow Risk Management Solutions behind Asset Swaps, Strategic Investments, DCM – Project Financing, Cross Border Trades and Payment Flows.

Omer holds an MS in Financial Engineering from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI, USA and an MS in Finance from Imperial College Business School, London UK. Omer also served on the Imperial College Business School, Alumni Advisory Board (2016 – 2018). He holds a Flying PPL License.

João has more than 25 years of experience in the financial services industry, working in the treasury department, with a focus in emerging markets.

In the last 13 years, his focus has been on asset management. As a founding partner of an FCA-regulated investment management company based in London, his experience includes creating the entity and its entire operational infrastructure.

At its peak, the regulated entity had more than €400m of assets under management, deployed in 8 different funds (in different jurisdictions), from liquid strategies to private equity, invested globally including Frontier Markets, like Mozambique.

João holds a degree in Business from the Universidade Católica and has attended two senior executive programs at INSEAD.