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Rami Tabbara, 40, co-founder and co-CEO speaks to me on Zoom from Stake’s “cool set-up” at the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) located on Gate Avenue’s shiny financial and fintech district. He scans the camera around the office, to where his team are busying away behind the sce
If you visit Cool Inc.’s corporate website, you’ll discover it calls itself a chameleon due to the reptile’s ability to adapt to an ever-changing world. “The chameleon is distinctive and highly specialised,” the website rationalises, “He is charismatic and confident but maintains a powe…
For IVI's Cypriot founder Ivi Kyratzi, jewellery must pair as easily with a white t-shirt as with eveningwear. Her collections find sensuality in contradiction, bridging contemporary and classic, masculine and feminine, symmetrical and uneven.
Beirut-born chief executive Malek Sukkar speaks to me via video conference from his Dubai office looking ready to do business in a white shirt and dove-grey tie. It’s currently what he likes to call the Emirate’s “palatable season”. Behind him, the mid-afternoon sun streams throug…
In Silicon Valley, the buzz is all about eternal youth. Billionaires are pouring cash into immortality tech, the science of hacking old age and even death. Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal, has invested millions in the Methuselah Foundation, a non-profit that aims to make “90 the new 5…
The CEO of OnlyFans, Amrapali “Ami” Gan, is worried that you will have heard of her company but won’t understand what it does or how it works. “There’s been a lot of misconceptions about OnlyFans. Honestly, most people don’t even know what the business is.” And that is why, she confirms…
“The GameStop rally marked a crystallising moment for the online mob,” a technology reporter at The Washington Post wrote shortly after the dust had settled earlier this year, following a tumultuous swing of fortunes in which the equity price of the struggling American video game retail…
YOU’RE FROM COMO IN ITALY. YOU STARTED YOUR CAREER IN YOUR FATHER GIANFRANCO’S CLOTHING COMPANY IN THE US THEN CAME BACK TO ITALY AND CREATED YOUR OWN BRAND, NEW ENGLAND, WHICH YOU SOLD IN 2000. WHEN DID YOU BECOME THE CREATIVE DIRECTOR OF MONCLER? [Remo Ruffini] In 2000. MONCLER …
It’s a fact that nearly all tech startups set out with the intention of advancing human society. The reason why so many fail however, is not that their purpose was non-existent, but that their purpose was too narrow. Nicolas Zaatar and Charlie El Khoury, the Lebanese entrepreneurs…
The fifth cycle of Dubai Chamber's Smartpreneur Competition exceeded expectations, attracting high-potential start-ups. Revealed in August, the three finalists were ProvenMed Global in first place, Callix in second and PlasticFri in third.
Anisa Kamadoli Costa, Chief Sustainability Officer at Tiffany & Co. and Chair of its Foundation, reflects on an interesting journey to a role where she feels she truly belongs, beginning at Columbia University.
The Modist may be no more, but back in February 2019 (issue 73), it was just two years old and definitely on the rise. So we spoke to Ghizlan Guenez, the founder of this conservative fashion e-retailer, as she was on a quest to dispel the notion that modesty means being frumpy or un-chi…
Bill Gates is not wearing a seatbelt. I worry about his safety as we speed along the cleared roads of Ethiopia’s capital, Addis Ababa, flanked by military outriders, but his aides either don’t notice or know not to mention it, so I decide I shouldn’t wear one either. The goats have been…
While catering to the Middle East’s conservative culture and insatiable appetite for marriage, startup dating app Harmonica wants to revolutionise dating in the Arab world. It’s crazy that just a few years ago, Internet dating meant tethering yourself to your computer, but thanks to the…
The award-laden Emirati entrepreneur and deputy chairman of the Bin Ham Group has quietly pledged at least half his fortune to humanitarian causes, ensuring his generosity endures well beyond his own lifetime.
It’s a feel-good story with lots of happy endings. Toters has gone from startup app to thriving business in a couple of years, and it’s a stellar example of how hard work and great tech are more important than an original idea. Everyone has a great idea at some point or another in…
If there was ever a watershed moment for the tech industry in the Middle East, it’s now. Following Souq.com’s acquisition by Amazon last March for 580 million USD and Uber’s acquisition of Careem in June for a cool 3.1 billion USD, all eyes are on a new breed of startups. But don’t take…
With male fertility reportedly halved over the past forty years, Legacy founder Khaled Kteily is building a sperm bank startup that brings discreet, modern reproductive health within reach of men everywhere.
How do you change the mindset and allow entrepreneurship to flourish in the Middle East? Amir Hegazi, a former director at Souq.com and the founder of intoMENA, thinks he has the answer. “I think what’s fundamentally missing is a more entrepreneur-centric ecosystem, where the entreprene…
The Middle East may have been late to join the e-commerce party but as Souq.com and Noon.com compete for domination, the growth of online retail is also challenging the long-held reign of the shopping mall in the region. To put e-commerce in historical context, you might think of it as …
With his infectious enthusiasm and meticulous approach to creative solutions, Crescent Enterprises’ CEO Badr Jafar, makes changing the world look easy as pie. Envision the archetypal modern-day social entrepreneur: you’re likely conjuring a kind of capitalist Robin Hood, someone looking…
Augustinus Bader is the latest miracle product to hit skincare shelves. The age-defying formula is being pegged as a game changer by a bevy of celebrities but is it also a case study in stellar marketing? Hollywood’s latest hit is not a movie. That’s the slogan being splashed across gia…
Lettuce is hard to grow in the desert, so Emirates Flight Catering is countering with vertical farming. California's Crop One is building the world's largest such facility in a forty-million-dollar joint venture.
As the Caribbean's most glamorous regatta returns for its tenth edition, the CEO of Richard Mille EMEA reflects on title sponsorship, racing aboard Sorcha and why watchmaking and sailing share a relentless pursuit of performance.
Don’t get het up about our region’s poor infrastructure and political roadblocks: Palestine-based accommodation booking startup Yamsafer demonstrates success comes down to simply zoning in on opportunity. You might wonder why Yamsafer would want to compete against existing hotel booking…
Looking to invest in real estate? How about a prime piece of land surrounded by mountains and trees in sunny Palestine? Even better, how about a newly constructed, upscale pied-à-terre, just steps away from the country’s only outdoor shopping mall where you’ll find all your family’s fav…
Having successfully propped up young British fashion designers since 2011, Tania Fares is now turning her attention to the Middle East with an initiative called Fashion Trust Arabia, and it’s got some lofty ambitions. And just in case you haven’t noticed, the region’s style seems to be …
It’s been 18 years since Hana Debs Akkari launched Senteurs d’Orient’s divine collection of soaps, but the company’s founding principals are as fresh as ever. The bourgeoning brand was built on a reputation of making soaps the traditional way, using the finest natural ingredients and es…
Zero Mass Water has the potential to change the lives of billions of people by using the power of the sun to make clean drinking water out of thin air. Have you ever wished you could make something appear out of thin air? Well that’s exactly what Cody Friesen did, as the founder and CEO…
Second-guessing Amazon is a fool's game. Already the everything store, it is now the world's third-largest tech company by revenue, on course for two hundred billion dollars in sales, some five hundred million daily.
How Cooper Hefner is reinventing the magazine in the era of #MeToo.
Go inside the region’s new entertainment hub.
This one-stop beauty shop by Lynn Khoury Soubra brings together the world’s most natural products so that you can rid your daily regimen of synthetic and chemical ingredients. 1. There’s a brick-and-mortar boutique in Saifi Village in Beirut but the website ships worldwide, and that mea…
The world's tenth richest man, in the midst of a political renaissance, is touted as America's best hope of ousting Donald Trump in 2020. We met him on a recent trip to London.
A dinner-table grumble about the paperwork of flying private inspired the Harvard graduate to build a San Francisco platform that shows jet owners exactly where their money goes.
Twenty years after Gianni's murder, Donatella staged the tribute to end them all at Milan Fashion Week, summoning the original supermodels and resurrecting his greatest hits before a new generation.
Supreme’s 50 per cent sale to Carlyle Group didn’t just represent a rags to riches story of a NY skateshop capitalising on anti-capitalism, it constituted the first ever investment by a large private equity firm in a streetwear brand. When James Jebbia founded Supreme in the SoHo neighb…
Virgin Group founder Sir Richard Branson ruled the skies with his airline. Now, the unconventional entrepreneur and philanthropist is aiming even higher. Sir Richard Branson could be forgiven for looking a little worn out. In the week prior up to our meeting, he visited Singapore, Malay…
Founded just four years ago, Tinder has launched a slew of offshoot platforms – including the exclusive and secretive Tinder Select – and has forever changed the game of love. Like many good love stories, this one begins on a night out. It is spring 2012, and a group of young men sit hu…
GORDON CAMPBELL GRAY WHY DID YOU BECOME AN HOTELIER? I first considered becoming an hotelier when, as a young boy we visited as a family a supposedly grand hotel, and I was struck as to how ordinary I thought it was compared to our own home, and I thought: “I could do this better…
The Beirut-based Zovighian family's youth-focused venture treats social responsibility as core business, working with millennials who crave meaning at work to cultivate the kind of employee profiles employers increasingly seek.
Born in 1985, Prince Mohammed bin Salman grew up overshadowed by three accomplished half-brothers, among them an astronaut and an Oxford-educated scholar, before his father, King Salman, transformed his prospects entirely.
They may be impatient and love selfies but Millennials are also the first generation in history to be worse off than their parents. Here are some exceptions to that rule. AYAH BDEIR Bdeir is a 33-year-old graduate of engineering from AUB who got a Master’s at MIT before founding …
The Seddiqi Holdings marketing chief explains how she turned a family watch-retail empire into an educational, non-commercial gathering that is placing Dubai firmly on the international horology map.
Ahmad Aweidah commutes more than an hour past Israeli checkpoints to reach PEX headquarters in Nablus. Movement restrictions can be punishing; one delay stretched to seven hours, another forced him to abandon his car entirely.
The billionaire founder of Tesla and SpaceX is not one to shy away from outlandish goals. His latest, unveiled to a rapt crowd in Guadalajara, involves colonising Mars through manned missions intended to begin as soon as 2022.
Tadashi Yanai started out making fashion at knockdown prices. Then he saw a future in simple, quality clothing. Now the owner of Uniqlo wants to turn his retail company into something that matters. As he approaches an age others may consider retiring at, Tadashi Yanai, the most successf…
Sometimes there comes a story of someone overcoming adversity such as war, poverty, and displacement – to achieve beyond expectation. The story of Mark Haidar is one of those. In 2011, Mark Haidar and his business partner Scott Harper pooled their combined savings of just 50 USD to foun…
CEO Sami Khoreibi sheds light on how solar power is taking over the grid. His company, Enviromena, is spearheading the way for this hot technology in the Middle East. The future is now, according to Sami Khoreibi, CEO of Abu Dhabi-based Enviromena. With a growing list of large-scale sol…
In the Arab world, conflict and poverty too often limit access to schooling. Maysa Jalbout, chief executive of a billion-dollar foundation, is determined to change that for thousands of struggling youths, one student at a time.
As Wikipedia – the free, open content digital encyclopaedia created through the collaborative effort of a community of online users – celebrates its 15th anniversary, its co-founder, Jimmy Wales, says his dream is that every single person on the planet has free access to knowledge. Acco…
In a world awash with crude, drilling nears completion at southern Azadegan, the region's largest oilfield. After years of sanctions, the struggle to bring new production online is etched across the ageing infrastructure.
At last year’s Davos World Economic Forum, John Defterios caught up with the Managing Director and CEO of King Abdullah Economic City, Fahd Al Rasheed, so we could learn more about their 100 billion USD megaproject in Saudi Arabia that’ll one day span an area the size of Washingto…
In 2004, Studio Libeskind, with Zaha Hadid Architects and Arata Isozaki, won the redevelopment of an abandoned thirty-six-hectare plot that once held the Fiera di Milano. Their bold master plan seems quietly touched by the Middle East.
A seed was sown when a Paris-based tech company, founded by Lebanese data scientist Rand Hindi, turned down a lucrative US contract to build useful technology ethically. Now they seek to free us from digital enslavement.
Abdlatif Youssef Al-Hamad's career has glittered: an honours graduate of Claremont McKenna and Harvard, a Kuwaiti delegate to the United Nations, then Director-General of the Kuwait Fund for Arab Economic Development and, briefly, a government minister.
When it comes to Arab titans of business, we’re all familiar with the Ghosns, Slims and Hayeks of this world. I would assume you’re also aware of others like Lubna Olayan and Nemir Kirdar. You may even know that Steve Jobs is among our greats given that he was the biological son of a Sy…
In a world where powerful women are still too often defined by powerful men, former Nigerian finance minister Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala is refreshingly her own person. John Defterios meets the architect of her country's economic reforms.
Collaborating with such designers as Paul Smith, Vivienne Westwood and Alexander McQueen, The Rug Company, spearheaded by Suzanne and Christopher Sharp, do not make modern rugs per se. Rather, they make beautifully handmade traditional ones that embrace a contemporary aesthetic. It isn’…
Developers once champed at the bit to break ground on Oman's integrated resort towns. Despite the global financial crisis and the Arab Spring, two of the Sultanate's most ambitious projects are still plodding on.
The Arab world has weathered many false starts, from Dubai's 2009 debt collapse to the Arab Spring and the disruptive rise of Isil and falling oil prices. Yet the region's appetite for trade and investment endures.
Resembling enormous containers stacked like tipping books, Arena is a striking addition to Jeddah's Al Nahdah roadside. That was precisely the intention, says general manager Hussein Madi, for a gym that preaches and practises doing things differently.
Strolling through the glass-roofed atrium of Coutts' Strand headquarters, Mohammad Kamal Syed offers an impromptu history of philanthropy, pausing beside a portrait of Angela Burdett-Coutts, the Victorian heiress and friend of Dickens who gave her fortune away.
Over four decades, the World Economic Forum has grown into the annual gathering of the world's leading chief executives and politicians. At over 1,500 metres, the Alpine town of Davos lends them rare perspective.
As a child, Yasmin Agha spurned dolls and toy cars for receipt books and branding, casting her parents as customers. Years later, poised to begin a PhD in England, her plans took an unexpected turn.
In tempestuous times, a rare breed of trader still posts incredible returns. Meet Philippe Jabre, the Franco-Lebanese star and founder of one of Europe's best-performing hedge funds, born in Beirut to a brewing dynasty.
As I make my way through the busy streets of Ashrafieh, it might be due to my biased perception but my eyes are drawn to Maktabis everywhere. And all of them in the carpet business. There’s Nivine Maktabi’s Oumnia, with its modernist tribal rugs, Hadi Maktabi’s traditional Oriental carp…
Founder of womenswear label Dough, Dima Kassis began in Morocco, recasting the region's colour-rich, heavily embroidered caftans as minimalist pieces in muted navies and blacks, softened with lace yet faithful to their original silhouette.
An athlete, adventurer and entrepreneur, the Dubai-based Yousuf Al Hashimi carries wisdom well beyond his 27 years. Co-founder of Ahdaaf Sports Club, he is on a mission to get the Middle East moving and its waistline shrinking.
In our part of the world, family businesses hold profound weight, their inherited wisdom guiding decisions for generations. The world's most enduring luxury brands, our writer finds, regard their own pasts in much the same way.
Founded by an Indian family from Kerala, this third-generation, Dubai-based group has grown from a single 1960 school into an educational empire valued at as much as 550 million, with bold plans for the decade ahead.
Anna Karenina's famous opening, that every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way, frames our writer's argument. Family businesses, like Tolstoy's families, tend to command attention precisely when their fortunes falter.
The company bears one name, but the business is very much three. For Azza Fahmy, working alongside her two daughters proves the whole is greater than its parts, marrying traditional handcrafted jewellery with a thoroughly contemporary outlook.
At first sight, you’ll never guess that Marianne Hoayek is the right hand of one of the world’s strongest and most respected central bank governors. Ignore those good looks and youthful exuberance because underneath lies a powerfully intelligent and determined person. Marianne Hoayek ma…
Seven years on, Philippe Massoud’s ilili , the New York-based Mediterranean fusion restaurant is busy redefining the concept of Lebanese cuisine. New York City is now several years deep into its fascination with Brussels sprouts. In a town known for its seasonal food fads – think pork b…
Bangkok hardly needs another shopping mall, unless you head Central Group's marketing. Founded in 1947 by Hainanese immigrant Tiang Chirativat, the family-owned conglomerate now oversees sprawling international holdings, with the Middle East firmly in its sights.
The stratospheric ascent of Ahmed Seddiqi & Sons is bound to the rise of Dubai itself. Now the world's ninth largest importer of Swiss watches, with over fifty brands, the company began from decidedly modest beginnings.
Slower than global markets to recover after the 2008 crash, the region's bourses saw turnover so thin that Gulf brokerages collapsed. Yet by 2013 Arab exchanges and their listed corporations emerged as surprisingly worthy contenders.
A decade ago, during a London cab ride shortly after 9/11, Kuwaiti business graduate Dr Naif Al-Mutawa conceived a comic featuring Islamic superheroes. Rather than complain about Islam's image, he set out to reshape it.
Inspired by Sojourner's images of the Martian surface in 1997, Bas Lansdorp resolved to go there himself. He explains how each piece of the puzzle fell into place, prompting him to found Mars One.
Inventor of the boutique hotel concept, Ian Schrager saw the future of the hotel industry before it came. Now, he goes even further by turning the concept on its head, redefining the notion of a boutique experience as being a matter of size. Miami. June 10. Monday. A rumpled visionary, …
The region is seeing exponential growth in record-breaking, with applications up 300 to 400 per cent across the UAE, Saudi Arabia and Egypt over five years, says Talal Omar, who manages the MENA region.
With oil, royal wealth and entrepreneurs, our region has no shortage of moguls. Our writer considers their philanthropic legacy, from Saudi Arabia's Mohamed Bin Issa Al Jaber to Lebanon's Hariri family and their socially conscious foundations.
Self-made millionaire, trainer and bestselling author T. Harv Eker, founder of Peak Potentials Training, explains how a personal journey through ruin and recurring financial frustration gave rise to Secrets of the Millionaire Mind.
When Daniele Cavalli, son and heir of Roberto, took charge of the label's menswear, he steered it in a bold new direction whilst remaining true to its past, prompting reflection on what keeps fashion afloat.
With youth unemployment nearing 25 per cent in places, surviving the coming decade demands a surge of new jobs. For the region's healthcare pioneers, survival itself has become a market and creating jobs the mission.
With Middle East youth unemployment at 26.4 per cent against a global 12.6, leaders from Tunisia to Oman are backing entrepreneurship and public-sector jobs. We ask whether small and medium organisations hold the answer.
Saudi Arabia's oldest family business, the House of Alireza, traces its modest beginnings to the Jeddah import trade in 1845. Known locally as Beit Zainal, after founder Zainal Alireza, it grew into a global enterprise.
Nassim Taleb, the controversial thinker who predicted the 2008 financial crisis hates bankers, academics and journalists. He also eats like a caveman and goes to bed each day at 8pm. Intrigued, we took the risk of meeting him. How much does Nassim Taleb dislike journalists? Let me count…
The International Energy Agency dropped several bombshells: America has overtaken Russia in gas, will surpass Saudi Arabia in oil by 2020, and become a net energy exporter by 2030. We examine what made it possible.
Behind the glitter lies a quieter tale of ambition. From Bahrain's Investcorp steering Tiffany towards global expansion, Arab investment houses are increasingly acquiring famous names and helping carry them triumphantly across the world.
Milan-based Mario Griariotto, CEO of retail and marketing at Slowear, reflects on a working life in fashion, a sector brimming with creativity, talent, glamour and culture that represents Made-in-Italy excellence the world over.
Two things strike you on meeting David Crickmore, CEO of luxury fragrance house Amouage: a confident manner so disarming you forget it is an interview, and impeccable taste in ties. We meet at Muscat's Chedi hotel.
Runner-up at Miss Lebanon 2010, winner of Miss Australia 2012 and third at Miss World, Jessica Kahawaty speaks four languages, is completing a double degree in law and finance, and is passionately involved in charitable work.
He deserves praise, even if he plainly dislikes it. In Medgulf's executive suite overlooking Solidere and the sea, John Andrews coaxes a reluctant Lutfi Fadel el-Zein to reflect on building the region's largest insurer.
Five hundred million of us now broadcast our every mood, insight and outrage in tweets, warned that silence means falling behind. A spirited meditation on social media's grip and the quiet pleasures of switching off.
Why do men of a certain age and standing suddenly deem it acceptable to fling a tie over the shoulder before dining? Not at informal desk lunches, but at fine restaurants, no less.
The heads of the Trickponi showroom discuss their catchy, song-inspired name and their unconventional approach to retail. From road sales to hauling their wares across the globe, they reveal how they defy convention.
The London-based founders explain how a playful Swahili greeting in Kenya, meaning traveller, inspired their label's name. They discuss their ethical focus and the original, catchy identity they were determined to create together.
Offered the chance to go backstage at Hackett's first-ever runway show and to interview the man behind the label, we caught the first plane out, expecting drama and chaos and finding something altogether calmer.