34143343 Banking Business Review May 10

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BUSINESSNEVER SLEEPS.

2 BANKING AND BUSINESS REVIEW February 2010

EDItoR

K Raveendran [email protected]

coNSUltING EDItoR

Matein Khalid [email protected]

PUBlIShER & MANAGING DIREctoR

Sankaranarayanan [email protected]

DIREctoR FINANcE

Anandi Ramachandran [email protected]

GENERAl MANAGER

Radhika Natu [email protected]

EDItoRIAl

contributing EditorsAnand Vardhanlinda Benbow [email protected] Sethi [email protected] Ramanan [email protected]

DESIGNUjwala Ranade [email protected]

SAlES AND MARKEtING

Account Manager

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AccoUNtS Biju varghese [email protected] Supervisor Ibrahim A. hameed PRINtING

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Vol. VI. No. 47 May 2010

K raveendran

editor’s note

A new excitement

There is no doubt that institutional interest in the SME sector is at an unprecedented level. This is not to suggest that small and medium businesses were inconsequential

at any time in the past. But a convergence of initiatives at various levels has taken the sector to a new level of attention and caring.

The latest in the series is the move for a legislation at the federal level, which will coordinate initiatives at the level of individual emirates, such as the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for SMEs in Dubai and the Khalifa Foundation for SME Development in Abu Dhabi, and develop these into a national plan for the small and medium enterprises. A new law is learnt to be in the final stages, which will make life easier and financial resources more accessible for the small and medium businesses.

The sector had in the past failed to attract the attention that it required for growth from the banking sector, due to a number of reasons, including the availability of more glamorous businesses for the banks to make money from. But as the options got limited, they have turned to the sector in a big way, although many of the challenges that kept them off the sector still remain.

But with the institutional interest in the sector reaching a new level, there is considerable excitement about the role and scope of SMEs.

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BANKING AND BUSINESS REVIEW May 20104

CONTENTS

SPECIAL

8 Small is very big Federal law coming for development of SME sector14 Credit guarantees critical Higher risk premiums caused by information gaps

SMEs go internationalMonetary discipline and support are keyOpportunities aboundRisk-reward balance crucialUnified national policy requiredSME index a useful toolHandholding to tide over crisisRefinancing for lenders helps

European heritage adapted to GCCA well-brewed successBenefiting from oil boom

6 RETAIL Opportunities mixed with challenges

20 SME - BANKS

46 REAL ESTATE

50 WEALTH

54 CREDIT RATING

38 SME - COMPANIES

Passion for breakthrough technologies

Private banking after perfect storm

S&P’s Gulf Region Series

21282DIBBusiBankSolutions275x205.pdf 5/3/10 10:15:41 AM


RETAIL

The relatively low consumer fi-nance availability, high credit card interest rate compared to the global average due to

higher default risk and lack of credit bureau data, and increasing competi-tion are posing a threat to the retailing industry in the GCC.

This is further complicated by the ex-pansion of international retailers within the GCC to sustain their global business growth, a new report on the regional re-tailing industry reveals.

But along side there exists a plethora of opportunities as well, the report by Alpen Capital points out.

The retail sector is leading from the front in the GCC’s ambition to move away from oil dependency towards a diversified economy. The region is en-hancing its footprint in the global retail map buoyed by factors such as healthy population growth, rising per capita in-come, growing middle class, improving service sector and burgeoning travel and tourism sectors. Moreover, the modern shopping malls anchoring state-of-the-art hypermarkets, highly developed free trade zones, various shopping festivals/events and relaxed tax provision for in-dividuals provide further growth impe-tus to the sector, the report says.

According to Alpen, currently, re-tail projects of around 6 million sq m of Gross Leasable Area (GLA) are under-way, which will constitute the region’s retail space supply by 2012. This reflects optimism amongst mall developers and retailers in general. Race for more retail space in the GCC is not restricted to lo-

Low credit availability, increasing competition pose threat to industry

Opportunities mixed with challenges

The GCC is enhancing its footprint in the global retail map buoyed by factors such as healthy population growth, rising per capita income, growing middle class, improving service sector and burgeoning travel and tourism sectors

cal participants; many foreign retailers have initiated their retail operation in the region to leverage on its substantial growth prospects.

The rising GLA in the retail space is expected to be matched by demand growth in the sector. Alpen Capital es-timates GCC retail demand growth at a CAGR of 9.5 per cent in 2010-12. For 2010, the industry growth is projected at around 8.3 per cent. Growing popula-tion and rising per capital expenditure

are key underlying reasons for this demand growth, it points out.

“Moreover, we expect ro-bust growth in retail demand from travellers in transit (air-port retail) and tourists. Phar-macy and electronic sales, al-though minuscule in terms of contribution to the total retail scale, are also posting signs of healthy progression,”, the re-port says.

Retailers with focus on non-discretionary goods will continue to outperform in the short term while those pro-moting discretionary products,

large ticket items in particular, may face challenging market conditions for a while. The view is further supported by the 1Q 2010 financials posted by GCC retailers wherein nondiscretionary re-tailers posted healthy top-line progres-sion while discretionary retailers pre-sented subdued performance.

However, over a medium-to-long term horizon, Alpen Capital foresees investment merit also in more cyclical

BANKING AND BUSINESS REVIEW May 2010 7

discretionary goods segments. Along with significant growth, there has been a qualitative shift in retail consumer behaviour in the GCC. The key trends developing in the region are – rising acceptability of modern retail format, increased preference for international brands, growing prominence of online retailing and enhancing appreciation for innovative ideas and offerings.

The rise in population, urbanization, middle class (with increasingly higher per capita income), inflow of tourists and number of passengers in transit continue to provide congenial condi-tions for retail to develop in the GCC countries. The report projects GLA ad-dition of approximately 6 million sq m in the GCC retail space in 2010-12.

“Looking at the region as a whole, we see demand growing at a sufficient pace to absorb the healthy pipeline of new space. That said, some cities, Dubai in particular, will depend on continued

strong growth in tourism to absorb the incremental retail space.

Alpen Capital expects the non-dis-cretionary retail segment to continue to register healthy growth momentum in 2010 while the discretionary seg-ment is likely to remain subdued. “We expect revival in demand generated from tourists and passengers in transit to provide a further boost to retail sales in 2010. Further, pharmaceuticals and online retail presents latent growth po-tential,” it says.

Alpen says it expects revival in de-mand generated from tourists and pas-sengers in transit to provide a further boost to retail sales in 2010. As per its estimates, short-visit tourist retail sales is expected to register revival while sales at duty-free shops at airports will rise significantly under the impact of rising passenger traffic. This rate can be higher than the estimates given the rate at which airport infrastructure work is

under progress. Annual events such as the Dubai Shopping Festival will continue to at-tract international shoppers, the report points out.

This encouraging view is substantiated by a 3.3 per cent year-on-year rise in Dubai ho-tel revenue quarter in the first 2010, the report says quoting a Department for Tourism and Commerce Marketing official.

The room occupancy rate increased to 76 per cent in the

first quarter from 73 per cent a year ear-lier.

The majority of the GLA addition is expected in the UAE and Saudi Arabia. Moreover, Qatar is expected to have major addition in GLA in 2012. The higher GLA addition for Saudi Arabia is justified given its high and growing population base – the Saudi population constitutes 63 per cent of the total GCC population and is expected to grow at CAGR of 3 per cent over the next few years. As a result, latent demand exist-ing in the Saudi retail market justifies significant GLA supply growth over the next few years, the report points out.

Dubai has the highest GLA per cap-ita in the region and the most at risk of oversupply, but also by far the strongest tourist destination. Therefore, although GLA per capita seems high in relation to its population, this is less of a con-cern when factoring in tourist spend-ing. Moreover, the tourists have a rela-tively higher propensity to consume and therefore post higher retail spend per capita, Alpen points out.

Given the GLA addition, retail mar-ket sizing from the supply-side depends on the absorption rate of additional supply of retail space. It says it would be misleading to assume that the over-all occupancy rate in the retail sector is high if new malls are fully occupied. The sector is witnessing a growing pref-erence for newer malls at the expense of older store formats.

Considering the mildly uncertain economic environment and risk of a paced absorption of new space in some regions, Dubai for example, Alpen has assumed the possibility of two scenar-ios: one of moderate growth with an occupancy rate of 60 per cent for the incremental organized retail space in the GCC region in 2010, 65 per cent in 2011 and 70 per cent by 2012. Under this scenario, the occupied GCC retail space would grow at a CAGR of 9.9 per cent in the years from 2010 to 2012, in line with the demand side estimate, it says.

The second scenario assumes an oc-cupancy rate of 80 per cent in 2010, 85 per cent in 2011 and 90 per cent by 2012, with the occupied GCC retail space growing at a CAGR of 12.6 per cent in 2010-12.

Retailers with focus on non-discretionary goods will continue to outperform in the short

term while those promoting discretionary products, large ticket items in particular, may

face challenging market conditions for a while


COVER STORY

8

SME SPECIAL

Federal law coming for the development of SME sector

Small is very

BIG


A series of legislative and ad-ministrative initiatives at the federal governmental and institutional levels is on

the cards to help the small and medium enterprise units in making access to fi-nancial resources easier and promote the SME sector as a vital growth engine of the local economy.

A most significant step in this direc-tion is a new federal law, expected to be issued in the next couple of months, which will outline a new definition of SMEs, procedures of establishing SMEs and meet the capital requirements of the sector. The new law envisages that the Ministry of Economy will be the nodal agency responsible for coordinat-ing various activities for the growth and development of the SME sector.

The move for a com-mon definition of the role and size of the SME unit at the federal level follows a similar exercise launched by Dubai, which redefined the SME unit in a more ap-propriate way so that these units become eligible for bank finance and other administrative support. The Dubai initiative, spearheaded by the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for Small and Medium Enterprises De-velopment, is expected to create a new platform and culture that will help

these units meet their various require-ments.

A number of studies on the sector had highlighted the absence of a uni-form definition of the role and identity of the SME sector as the biggest stum-bling block for banks and other finan-

cial institutions to provide finance and other support systems for the development of the sector.

The ministry has prepared a comprehensive proposal to de-velop the role of SMEs, after a de-tailed analysis on the current status of SMEs and the challenges faced by the sector. The plan also includes the proposed new definition of an

SME unit at the national level and the draft law on the sector’s development.

According to Sultan Bin Saeed Al Mansouri, UAE Minister of Economy, the ministry has studied and evaluated the status of SMEs in the country so as to identify the challenges and opportu-

The Ministry of Economy has prepared a comprehensive proposal to develop the role of SMEs, after a detailed analysis on the current status of SMEs and the challenges faced by the sector

10 BANKING AND BUSINESS REVIEW May 2010

The challenges faced by the SME sector typically include lack of financing, high operational costs, labour and training issues, absence of marketing network to promote national products and procedural obstacles

nities in this vital sector. The ministry evaluated the experience of 28 coun-tries in the field of small and medium businesses. “We are keen to coordinate efforts and exchange information with government departments in order to achieve best results and develop the performance of this vital sector,” he said while chairing the meeting of a co-ordination and economic cooperation committee recently, which discussed the government’s outlook regarding SMEs and the ministry’s mandate in this regard.

The challenges faced by the SME sector typically include lack of financ-ing, high operational costs, labour and training issues, absence of marketing network to promote national products and procedural obstacles. The new ini-tiatives are likely to include steps to see that the capital requirements of the SME sector are adequately met while at the same time reducing the bureau-cratic and other hurdles in the develop-ment of the sector.

The Ministry of Economy is in the process of finalizing the draft law for it to be referred to local government SME institutions and Chambers of Commerce in the individual emirates for their comments. It will then be pre-sented at the cabinet for approval. The ministry is also involving the coun-try’s banks in these consultations as the banking sector is expected to play a crucial role in the development of

the sector by way of a more favourable credit policy in terms of the small and medium enterprises.

Another important proposal under consideration is the launch of a Federal Credit Bureau to compile and provide authentic credit information, a move that will ensure transparency in the market. The credit bureau, which may cover both individual and corporate credit information services, will help the banks and financial institutions to better assess the risk of lending to the small and medium businesses, as the agency will collect and document credit information from various finan-cial authorities, companies, establish-ments, individuals and banks, in addi-tion to classifying and analysing them.

The establishment of a national-level credit bureau is seen as a ‘long-overdue’ step to ensure more efficient credit risk management and thus ensure macro economic stability in the country. The institution of such a mechanism would be helpful to both lenders and borrow-

ers as the bank or financial institution concerned will have access to complete information and transparent data about the financial situation of the borrower and their payment behaviour.

In early 2006, the Dubai Depart-ment of Economic Development had established Emcredit as a government-backed credit information services company, but as an emirate-level insti-tution, it suffered from credibility issues outside the emirate, which restricted its appeal to banks, financial institutions and other entities at a national level. Emcredit initially met resistance from the banking sector but is said to have grown since to hold 30 per cent of the country’s mortgage data and 5.6 mil-lion individual identification records. But a federal agency is expected to provide much more authenticity to the information sharing process as it will ensure much bigger participation from banks and other institutions. And with the involvement of the regulators, the collaboration between banks and the credit bureaus becomes organic.

Credit bureaus help in a big way to create a favourable environment for SME lending as they will help improve the banks’ assessment of debtors by be-ing able to quantify the risk more re-alistically. Generally banks have been found to reject between 50 per cent and 70 per cent of the applications for credit from SME owners. The most common reasons for the rejection are insufficient documentation, shorter duration of the company’s existence, unsound funda-mentals of the business. Some SMEs have looked to enhance their credit standing with banks by getting a rating from credit rating agencies.

While the banks are concerned with the risks associated with SME lending,


started and is in need of capital, it struggles to get any credit whatsoever from banks; later, when the business has plenty of money, banks cold-call to offer now-unnecessary credit on fa-vourable terms.

Another major problem faced by the SME units, particularly the start-ups, in the UAE is that a majority of them do not fall into the category of SME defini-tion followed internationally.

To be a SME or a micro-enterprise, an enterprise has to satisfy the criteria for the number of employees and one of the two financial criteria -- either the total turnover or total invested capital. Internationally, definitions based on

While the banks are concerned with the risks associated with SME lending, the owners of small businesses complain that they are not able to get the financing support that they need from the banks

the owners of small businesses com-plain that they are not able to get the financing support that they need from the banks. And even if they manage to get some bank to finance them, the interest rates are too high, which is a brake on economic growth. At 20 per cent, the typical interest rate for an unsecured loan is twice the 10 per cent rate prevalent in Western Europe.

But according to the banks, the ex-ceptionally high interest rates on unse-cured business lending in the UAE are a result of a significant risk premium. The perceived risk has two key reasons: one is the difficulty in assessing the credit quality of businesses in a data sparse environment like the UAE. Also, the UAE has a very informal business culture which leads to incomplete and unreliable financial statements.

Banks say it is difficult to distin-guish between high and low risk debt-ors and this is probably the result of an information asymmetry between borrowers and lenders. If banks can improve their assessment of debtors then they will be able to quantify risk more precisely. Banks aim to minimize this risk by screening applicants and granting credit only to those that meet standards. Naturally, the standards for unsecured loans are tighter than for se-cured loans.

The typical criteria followed by banks in lending to SMEs include a minimum period of existence for the company, usually between one and three years, and the availability of financial state-ments to cover that period, ideally au-dited, and for smaller companies bank statements (cash flows) over the period. Many banks specify a minimum turn-

over, typically between Dh100,000 and

Dh250,000.Also, small and medium businesses

face greater difficulties in accessing finance during the start-up phase. In most developed markets, it is possible to get viability based financing, where an aspiring businessman applies for a loan on the basis of a business plan. On a commercial basis this is effectively non-existent in the UAE, it is pointed out.

This presents a great dichotomy in the system. When a business is getting


employee size range from under 250 (European Union) to under 500 (US small business administration). Based on turnover, figures below $50 million are considered indicative of a medium sized enterprise, while below $10 mil-lion is a small business.

But in the GCC, the definition varies depending on the scale of the national economy and the size of the country’s

The most common reasons for the rejection of loan applications by the SME units are insufficient documentation, shorter duration of the company’s existence, unsound fundamentals of the business

labour force. In the Gulf countries, a small industrial enterprise is generally one with less than $2 million of invest-ment and a medium enterprise is one with $2-6 million invested capital, with units involving an investment of more than $6 million being considered large. What these units generally require is macro-finance, but that is an area which is yet to be developed locally, although bankers consider this to be a significant area of interest in their future strate-gies.

It is pointed out that support of government agencies and institutions such as the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for Small and Medium Enterprises in Dubai and the Khalifa Fund for Enterprise Development in Abu Dhabi is vital in ensuring low cost finance to units of this type. Since its inception, the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment has assisted in support-ing about 9,000 entrepreneurs to evalu-ate and start their businesses and facili-tated their access to more than Dh720 million in government contracts. The critical role of the Establishment is to develop the leadership of local Emira-tis and support their entrepreneurship. Similarly, the Khalifa Fund has provid-ed Dh350 million for 211 projects in the SME sector since its inception in 2007.

13BANKING AND BUSINESS REVIEW May 2010

The typical size of the unit financed by the Khalifa Fund is about Dh1.5 mil-lion, which clearly shows the profile of units getting assistance from these gov-ernment institutions.

UAE Central Bank Gov-ernor Sultan bin Nasser Al Suwaidi has indicated the possibility of the federal government launching a loan scheme for small and medium enterprises, with special focus on start-up businesses. Under this, the government would offer capital to support SMEs initially, probably in the form of ‘full collateral’ in the first phase of the initia-tive as the rate of failure for start-ups is considered to be significantly high.

As the Ministry of Economy feels that banks that focus on SMEs and provide low-cost finance to entrepreneurs need to be encouraged, it is creating joint programmes with SME-focused banks. For instance, the bank has signed a Memorandum of Understand-ing (MoU) with HSBC Middle East, to support the international expansion of the SMEs. As part of the memorandum, HSBC has launched a $100 million fund specifically for UAE companies with a turnover of $30 million or below, which are engaged in cross-border business. The UAE fund is part of the HSBC’s global strategy to support internation-ally focused SMEs, by ensuring that

they have access to appropriate credit to enable them to grow and conduct busi-ness internationally.

Lending from the fund will be made to SMEs in the UAE that need working capital finance for international expan-sion, with high priority accorded to Emirati-owned businesses.

A recent study by Duns & Bradstreet on the funding of SME sector found that banks with a strategic focus on the SME market try to tailor their credit and other banking products to meet the needs of this segment. They do this

by offering less complex versions of the financial products offered to larger compa-nies, by relaxing docu mentat ion r e q u i r e m e n t s , and training staff specifically to deal with small businesses. It r e c o m m e n d e d that the financial services aimed at small busi-nesses should be designed to grow with the business, providing scal-able solutions and a smooth upgrade path to larger lines of credit.

Smaller busi-nesses often have fewer cash re-serves and vola-tile cash flows

and they often de-pend on access to finance not just for growth but for their survival. The re-port points out that the smaller sizes of the loans and simpler businesses in the SME market mean that it is logical to reduce turnaround times on credit de-cisions for banks. The value at risk on a loan decreases, thus it makes sense for the bank to reduce the cost of making a loan decision. Not only that, but in the highly competitive UAE market a cus-tomer kept waiting too long may well go elsewhere.


Higher risk premiums caused by information gap, lack of recovery mechanism

Credit guarantees critical

Bankers feel that some sort of a credit guarantee by the government or its designated agencies will go a long way

in ensuring adequate bank financing for the SME units as lending to the sector otherwise presents a relatively higher risk proposition.

While the banks are doubtless looking at SMEs as a distinct market segment and registering 20-30 per cent year on year growth in lending to the

SME sector, they remain cautiously optimistic when it comes to funding them. One of the reasons for their concern is that there is no standard-ized recovery mechanism to seize the assets of defaulters. Although some legal framework for this may be in place, the results and speed of the process can sometimes lack consist-ency and involve long delays. Another reason for the uncertainty is that small trading and services companies

constitute the majority of the sector and it is quite difficult to predict their long term cash flows or assets that can serve as useful collaterals.

The biggest problem, of course, is that there is a fundamental informa-tion gap between the lenders and the borrowers with the result that banks are unable to accurately ascertain the creditworthiness of their borrowers, so they add hefty risk premiums to their interest rates. This in turn makes

16

finance less affordable to the small and medium businesses.

Given the high-risk nature of the sector, it is believed that a third of all small and medium businesses do not make it to the bank in terms of fund-ing even under normal circumstances. Crisis situations hurt the sector as much as any other, but these units do not feel the pinch immediately as some payments continue to come by and as such there is a time lag before they are seriously affected. But once that hap-pens, their problems continue to per-sist beyond the resolution of the crisis. So, the small businesses may be the last to enter the credit crisis, but they are also the last to come out of it. The liquidity crisis is not just one-sided, as the banks are also very much a part of the process and suffer from their own liquidity issues.

It is in the backdrop of such a scenario that the banks are asking for help from the government in terms of guarantees and safeguards against default, although they have no hesita-tion in admitting that the sector is potentially one of the most promising growth area for the banks.

“Credit guarantees are quite criti-cal for the banks to ensure expanded credit flow to the small and medium businesses,’ says Hemant Lalithraj, Senior Vice President, Retail Banking Group, SME Business, Mashreqbank. Equally important is the need for greater transparency and monitor-ing of the sector so that some of the undesirable tendencies shown by the owners of small businesses, such as the diversion of working capital to specu-lative purposes, as it happened during the property boom, are held in check, he argues.

Rajesh Gupta, Head, Products & Segmentation, SME Banking, Standard Chartered, highlights the importance and growth potential of the SME sec-

tor, but at the same time points out that the information asymmetry that prevails in the SME sector needs to be addressed. SME units are not known to be good at financial transparency, but in the interest of greater liquidity for funding their growth, the regula-tors need to encourage them to follow regular financial reporting systems so that it is easier to monitor them. Also, there has to be central registry for the SME sector, which will help the banks in assessing the strengths and weak-nesses of the units and assess them more realistically, he said.

Nicholas Levitt, Regional Head of Business Banking HSBC, says credit guarantees do help, but points out that there are examples of credit guarantee achieving outstanding success while in some other markets it has flopped.

Hong Kong is one place where govern-ment guarantees have been packaged into an excellent service and this has contributed tremendously in the growth of the sector. But in certain other markets, it has complicated the issue further, leading to a lot of avoid-able bureaucracy and delays, with the result that it simply fails to further the interests of the small and medium businesses.

According to Citibank, a key trend of the post-financial crisis environment is that the banks are offering lending facilities linked to clients’ ‘trade cycles’ rather than providing them facilities where there was limited end-moni-toring. Citibank says it is looking at innovative lending solutions for com-panies by mitigating risk through a combination of factors including credit

There is a fundamental information gap between the lenders and the borrowers with the result that banks are unable to accurately ascertain the creditworthiness of their borrowers, so they add hefty risk premiums to their interest rates



insurance. Citibank typically adopts a cautious approach to the small and medium enterprise businesses. “Given that all banks are operating in the same playing field, lending across both retail and commercial bank space has been cautious,” a bank spokesman said.

Citibank suggests that there should be mandatory filing of financial state-ments for companies and this could be started with companies where lending is more than Dh250,000. This data is anyway reported by banks to the Central Bank and this will help banks make better risk decisions.

Additionally, there is dearth of data on the commercial sector overall. Highlighting the importance of a credit bureau, the bank says that if an independent body can provide cred-ible information, banks will be well positioned to cater to their require-ments.

A J Vidyasagar, Chief Executive Officer of State Bank of India (SBI), points out that competition is obvi-ously providing greater accessibility to finance as well as credit at cheaper rates to small and medium businesses. “But SMEs are generally considered to be in the higher risk category. Hence post the financial crisis, financial institutions would be more careful in lending to this segment. While there would be no drying up of finance, financial institutions would lay greater emphasis on the security aspect and focus more on sound financials of the company,” he explained.

According to Ashok Gupta, Chief Executive, Bank of Baroda, UAE, the SME sector is one of the most adverse-ly affected due to the financial crisis. The working capital requirement of SME borrowers has increased due to delay in sales realization owing to slow down in the market. This has resulted in an increase in demand for working capital finance from SME borrowers. On the other hand their business vol-

umes have gone down, which means they need proper hand holding facili-ties to tide over the crisis. There is also greater need for better monitoring of credit portfolio by the banks to avoid deterioration in the health of credit portfolio, he added.

Mohammed Ahmed Wajdi, Senior Vice President and Head of Business Banking, Dubai Islamic Bank, is call-ing for the establishment of a sector-wise index for the SMEs. He suggests that the index can be calculated on the basis of the number of SMEs in the relevant industry proportion to the total enterprises. Against this, there

is a need to establish the ideal size of establishments within a range and their characteristics, such as labour and capital intensity, he explains.

He points out that arriving at a common definition for the SME unit has created further awareness among the banking and financial industry about the critical importance of the SME as a backbone of the UAE econ-omy and the new national plan for the development of the SME sector, which is being prepared by the Ministry of Economy will further facilitate the role of the small and medium businesses in the country’s economic development.

Corporate Banking Services in UAE

Trade FinanceLetters of Credit •

(Issuing/Advising/Confirming)Trust Receipts•Export&ImportBills•

(Collection/Negotiation/ Purchase/Discount)

BankGuarantees•Buyers’Credit&Suppliers’•Credit

Working Capital FinanceFundBased•

(Overdraft,DemandLoanetc.)Non-FundBased•

(LCs,BGsetc.)

StateBankofIndia’sDIFCBranchisregulatedbyDFSA.IntermsofitslicenseitcanofferNon-DirhamcredittoanyCorporate.DepositscanbesourcedinanyNon-DirhamcurrencyfromProfessionalClientsinNon-statemarkets.

DIFC Branch – Regulated by the DFSA POBox482033,Level2,GateVillage05,DIFC,Dubai,UAE.

Tel+97143230203;[email protected]•Websitewww.sbi.ae

State Bank of India

Term FinanceProjectFinance(Green-field&•Brown-fieldprojects)alongwithAdvisoryServicesAugmentationofWorkingCapital•ImportofPlant&Machinery•

SyndicationParticipationinSyndicated•Deals(Primary&SecondaryMarket)alongwitharrangingandunderwriting

DepositsAcceptnon-DirhamDeposits•fromProfessionalClientsinNon-StateMarkets

COVER STORY


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

Monetary discipline and support are keyMashreq says government guarantees will greatly help banks in offering credit

Mashreq firmly believes that growth of the SME sector provides an important boost to

an economy – SME sector constitutes 90 per cent of the financial system in our region. Mashreq has succeeded in becoming a leading name associ-ated with small and medium sized enterprises sector in the UAE through several initiatives and business devel-opment activities undertaken to boost this sector, according to Hemant Lali-thraj, Head of SME Business.

In this respect, he hailed the ini-tiatives of the Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment for SME Develop-ment in promoting the cause of the small and medium businesses. Also, a number of new and active measures are expected to be put in place by the UAE top leadership and government, which will strengthen the Emarati en-trepreneurs’ participation in the self-employed segment, thus help the SME units, he noted. Mashreq works closely with these institutions in formulating

policies and programmes to facilitate the growth of the SME sector, he said.

Hemant Lalithraj, who has a pas-sionate association with SME banking in the UAE from its early days, under-lined the need for close monitoring

of the small and medium busi-ness units so that any undesirable tendency is kept out of the sys-tem. Hemant is a seasoned banker with expertise in a number of various areas in the bank-ing industry.

Hemant cites the cases of ir-responsible be-havior by owners of small and me-dium enterprises during the spec-ulative run on

the stock market and later during the property boom in the country. “When they found that the stock market was yielding returns in multiples of what they could hope to make from their regular business, these business own-ers invested all their resources into the

Hemant Lalithraj, Head of SME Business


stock market. They even diverted their working capital into stock market in-vestments,” he pointed out.

“When the speculative bubble burst in the stock market, they found even a more attractive proposition in the property market, which happened to be riding one of the most unnatural booms in history. And when things suddenly went wrong, many of them found themselves faced with the pros-pects of ending their business”.

Hemant says Mashreq never stopped funding for the SMEs even during the financial crisis, but the bank was lending more prudently, with proper checks and balances in place so that there was no misuse of the fund. “We have always educated our customers to be more responsible borrowers. We ensure to offer tailor-made services as we are partners in the success of our customers” he said.

The bank has done a proper seg-mentation of its SME customers so as to identify the ones that have been bet-ter performers and those who ended up losing money in their businesses. This has helped the bank to selectively increase credit lines to healthy busi-nesses and even put further capital into their business. According to him, Mashreq has sophisticated tools to achieve this task and the results are already showing lower delinquency rates and a healthier portfolio of SME business.

Hemant said Mashreq encourages customers to avail of ‘self-liquidating’ facilities which do not leave much scope for misuse. “Self-liquidating fa-cilities are not evergreen facilities like overdrafts and this helps customers to

exercise greater self-discipline on the monetary front and it also makes their relationship with the bank easier. We also lay emphasis on products like fac-toring, which is a great help for open account trade,” he said.

Hemant says the bank’s SME busi-ness is showing significant growth and feels that the SME segment will see more banks entering the fray at a rapid pace. But those who are already present in the business strongly are likely to deploy more resources and capital into the business as the sector as a whole is growing at a remarkable rate. In this regard, Mashreq is already adding to its SME teams.

At the same time, he says the optimism has to be laced with caution. With real estate prices coming under a lot of pres-sure and banks go-ing into foreclosures, there is a great deal of stress expected into the SME space. A lot of measures being taken as corrective action will hurt in the short term but will be

Strategic partnership with government bodies and diversifying product offering plays an important role in attracting more customers

extremely healthy in the long term, he points out.

“Going by the experience during and after the crisis, banks need to keep their best customers and keep adding to the number. In the end, what distinguishes a bank from the rest would be its success in diversi-fying the product offerings, bringing in the best class of products from the rest of the world, providing high end convenience to their customers along with sophisticated delivery channels and service levels,” he says.


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

Unified national policy requiredCommon commercial licensing norms and definition together can really help, says ADCB

A unified commercial licens-ing policy for the small and medium enterprises along with a common definition

for the units together can provide very powerful support to the SME sector, according to Nilanjan Ray, Senior Vice –President and, Head of SME Banking, Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank.

“And we believe the Governments are taking concrete steps towards es-tablishing this unification to help sup-port SMEs,” he said.

At this point in time, commercial licensing is done separately by each Emirate. But a unified commercial li-censing and unification of definition for the segment can together be very powerful to support the sector, Nilan-jan emphasized.

According to him, while the recent policy initiatives will be helpful to the SME segment in the long run, current-ly the impact of the policy initiatives has not been felt across the businesses and one has to see support fro this from all the Emirates. “Support from appropriate authorities would also go a

long way in order to establish the wide-spread use of the definition in banking

industry. For instance, the common definition can be used to support the SME sector with suitable fiscal or monetary measures and to incentivize banks to in-crease lending to small and medium enterprises”.

The Head of ADCB’s SME Banking points out that there has been a dis-tinct preference to cash flow based lending over collater-al based lending in the sec-tor. At the same time, there has been an increased focus on designing niche products which cater to specialised clusters within SME sector. There has also been more focus on trade finance facil-ities, which are essentially self liquidating in nature.

Nilanjan notes that there are a number of banks that are now focussing heavily on

the SME sector. However, credit appe-tite across the banking sector has affect-

Nilanjan Ray


ed credit flow to SMEs. “At this point in time, we see a definite appetite for good SME credit risk, particularly if sup-ported by cash flows. While increased competition should lead to increased credit flow, sectoral concentration of credit on banks’ lending portfolio may affect this,” he points out.

He says ADCB is committed to sup-porting the SME sector. “We have con-tinually invested in people, new prod-ucts and processes for this sector over last two years whilst we have seen many of our competitors scaling back. This counter-cyclical approach has been very profitable for us as demonstrated in growth of our SME portfolio. As rec-ognition of our efforts we received an award from Bankers Middle East for our BusinessEdge suite of SME prod-ucts. As a result of these initiatives, ADCB’s SME business is carving out an ever-increasing share of the business lending book at ADCB”.

ADCB offers the entire suite of ac-count services and lending solutions. These include working capital solution,

While the recent policy initiatives will be helpful to the SME segment in the long run, currently the impact of the policy initiatives has not been felt across the businesses

installment finance and equipment fi-nance on the lending side along with complete range of account services. The bank also offers a full suite of trade fi-nance products to the SME sector. Re-cently ADCB launched a unique lend-ing solution for our current account customer linked to their transaction patterns which allows them an overall enhanced relationship with the bank, he said.

According to him, the bank is launching niche lending products to cater to specific clusters of SME cus-tomers. “For example, we are in the process of launching a financing prod-uct for medical professionals and hos-

pitals to support purchase of healthcare equipment. Similarly we are launching a financing solution for users of indus-trial imaging and printing equipment. We also have an online Fx platform for SME clients in the pipeline”.

Nilanjan said there are several cases where the bank’s funding has helped the SME units achieve outstanding growth and cited Coffee Planet as one of them. “We structured a financing solution for them to meet their equipment financing needs at the early stage of their opera-tion. Coffee Planet is a young and dy-namic company and we are happy to see it spread its wings across many loca-tions in the UAE,” he said.


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

SMEs go internationalHSBC Middle East positive about small and medium enterprises growth

Small and medium enterprises are increasingly international-izing their operations to add and diversify their revenue

streams and this new trend is driv-ing local and regional SME banking growth in 2010 to new levels.

“There is a two-way internation-alization taking place. On the one side, local companies are looking for inter-national opportunities for growth and diversification of their operations as they realize that they need to expand the scope of their businesses to replace reduced revenues in their domestic markets. In the same way, interna-tional companies are coming and set-ting up presences in the region, as it is identified as an increasingly significant global emerging market” says Nicho-las Levitt, Regional Head of Business Banking HSBC.

According to him, the confidence levels within the SME sector appear to be back to pre-financial crisis levels. He cites the results of an HSBC survey of the regional SMEs, which showed that the Middle East outlook correlates strongly to the global emerging market outlook, and as a major international trading hub, the region is well-placed

for future growth.In fact, government support for

SMEs is increasing throughout the Gulf and not just in the UAE, with nearly every country highlighting the business segment as a priority sector,

Nicholas points out. “We have seen substantial liquidity injec-tion, government stimulus and aid, as well as deposit guaran-tees, all of which will have a positive impact on the SME sec-tor,” he adds.

The extent of international business varies greatly from market to market, but overall, the level of SME internation-alisation is set to grow by 13 per cent by 2011, the survey showed.

Top reasons for doing busi-ness internationally are the sales and revenue opportunities as well as access to international markets as SMEs seek to diver-sify their risk beyond domestic markets.

The most preferred inter-national business locations for SMEs in the region are Greater

China, South-East Asia and Europe. The top barriers for the SMEs turning to international markets are unstable financial conditions, such as fluctuating exchange rates and interest rates, costs of essential services such as shipping, logistics and storage as well as

Nicholas Levitt, Regional Head of Business Banking


government regulations.The UAE is built on cross-border

trade conducted by entrepreneurial SMEs and this remains a critical com-ponent of the UAE economy, he said. There is a huge potential for the growth of UAE’s trade with emerging markets and HSBC is uniquely placed to finance the expansion plans of the country’s SMEs in this regard, he said.

HSBC has launched a $100 million fund for supporting small and medium businesses in the country. The fund, which is part of the bank’s global strat-egy to support internationally, focused SMEs, and Emirati owned businesses, is specifically targeted at UAE compa-nies with a turnover of $30 million or less to support them in cross-border business. Lending from the fund is meant for SMEs that need working cap-ital finance for international expansion and priority is given to Emirati-owned businesses.

Underscoring the important initia-tives taken by the UAE government and institutions like Dubai’s Mohammed Bin Rashid Establishment and Abu Dhabi’s Khalifa Fund for Small and Medium Enterprises, Nicholas pointed out that these measures signify the gov-ernment’s commitment to promote this vital sector. “Recent action by the UAE government to reduce the cost of set-ting up and conducting business in the UAE is a clear indicator of its commit-ment to maintain a business-friendly environment,” he notes.

Nicholas welcomed the reported moves on the part of the UAE federal government to launch a number of con-crete steps to promote greater transpar-ency in the functioning of the sector, including the proposed federal credit bureau.

Asked if the absence of govern-ment guarantees is hindering growth of credit flow to the small and medium

business units, he said there are exam-ples of both success and failure on this account. Some countries have explicit government guarantees packaged into their SME support services. “Hong Kong is a great example of how guarantees are helping the SME units to obtain working capital and investment funds that they require from time to time. But in certain other jurisdictions, the credit guarantee becomes counter-productive as the gov-ernment role adds to a lot of avoidable delay and reduces its application due to an excessive number of qualifying crite-ria,” he said.

HSBC, considered to be a market lead-er in the UAE SME banking sector, offers overdraft, trade finance and guarantees as part of the working capital finance fa-cilities and short and medium term loans to meet capital expenditure. These are in addition to a full complement of bank-ing services, including private banking, wealth management and insurance.


Business confidence among the Middle East’s small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is high according to a survey conducted in Q409 by TNS for HSBC. Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Egypt in the Middle East were included in the survey.

Across the region, a growing proportion of small busi-nesses are optimistic for their prospects in 2010 signaling increasing capital investment and recruitment.

Qatar business confidence was the highest at 159 points followed by Saudi Arabia at 125 points and Egypt at 110 points.

Globally, the SME indices tracked by HSBC in most countries and territories hold a positive outlook, with the Middle East at 125, Latin America at 118, the US

and Canada at 107 and the UK at 101. France is just below neutral at 94. But emerging markets in Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and Eastern Europe are significantly more optimistic than the developed markets of the US, Canada, the UK and France, with an average index of 121 versus 106.

The semi-annual HSBC Small Business Confidence Monitor gauges the six-month outlook of SMEs on local economic growth, capital investment plans and recruitment.

This was the first time that Middle East countries were included in the list of 20 markets, capturing the views of more than 6,000 SMEs in Asia, the Middle East, Europe, North America and Latin America – the

largest international survey of its kind. The results were used to calculate an index ranging from 0 to 200 where 200 rep-resents the highest confidence level, 0 represents the lowest, and 100, neutral. The survey was conducted in October and November 2009 by research agency TNS.

The survey showed that 47 per cent of the region’s SMEs expect local GDP growth to increase over the next six months. 36 per cent expect the pace to remain the same, and only 17 per cent expect growth to slow.

The survey found Middle East region to be the second most confident region, after In-dia when it came to investing in their own businesses in the first half of this year, with 47 per cent planning to increase their capital expenditures, 41 per cent saying they will maintain current levels and only 11 per cent are planning reductions.

Survey shows business confidence high


Recruitment sentiment in the Middle East is strongest glo-bally. 36 cent of the region’s SMEs say they will increase staff in the next six months and 58 per cent saying they will keep staff levels the same. Recruitment is generally stable across the 20 mar-kets in the survey.

The HSBC Small Busi-ness Confidence Monitor also asked SMEs about the extent of their cross-border trade and other international business, such as overseas opera-tions. Across all markets, 3 in 10 SMEs surveyed say they have some level of cross-border trade or international business. In Qatar, the number is nearly 7 in 10.

In Qatar 69 percent of SMEs surveyed were involved in international business, in Saudi Arabia it was 27 per cent and in Egypt 33 per cent.

When SMEs were asked if they plan to engage in international business in the next two years, 72 per cent of Qatar SMEs planned to grow their international business. In Egypt it was 28 per cent and in Saudi Arabia 19 percent.

Top reasons for doing business internationally are the sales and revenue opportunities as well as access to international markets as SMEs seek to diversify their risk beyond

Outlook on recruitment plans

domestic markets. Top international business locations for the region are Greater China, South-East Asia and Europe.


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

Opportunities abound for SMEsCitibank’s Small & Mid Market Enterprises business will be the growth engine for the next few years

It must be made mandatory for all banks to participate in the Credit Bureau, Citibank spokesmen told BBR in response to a question on

the issues that needed to be addressed to enhance credit flow to the SME sec-tor. Such a move will strengthen the overall financial services industry, they pointed out.

Even before we went to the press with the bank’s response came the announcement from the Media Of-fice of the Dubai Ruler’s Court that HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice-President and Prime Minister of the UAE, in his capacity as Ruler of Dubai, has issued a decree designating Emirates Credit Infor-mation Company (Emcredit) as the official credit information agency of Dubai and making it mandatory for all Dubai-based banks and financial institutions to join its database.

The development shows how keenly are the authorities tuned in to sug-gestions from the banking industry for improving the conditions for the growth of credit flow to the small and

medium business sector.“Access to reliable financial state-

ments is a concern not just for Citi but all banks. There should be mandatory filing of financial statements for com-panies and this could be started with companies where lending is more than Dh250,000. This data is any way re-ported by banks to Central Bank and this will help banks make better risk decisions,” said Sanjoy Sen, Consumer Bank Head – Middle East.

“There is a dearth of data on the commercial sector overall - if an in-dependent body can provide credible information, banks will be well posi-tioned to cater to their requirements,” he said.

Asked about how the moves to rede-fine the small and medium enterprise have helped in creating favourable conditions for the SME units, Satyajeet Roy, Local Commercial Bank Head, said Citi globally has a well-defined SME and MME (Mid-market enter-prises) target market definition. “The SME definition falls broadly within the recent announcement and we believe

that this initiative will definitely help the banking community to address the needs of SME’s in a structured way”.

According to Citibank, the post-fi-nancial crisis environment has seen the bank adopt a cautious approach to the SME/MME businesses and the lend-

Sanjoy Sen

ing business overall. “ Increasingly, we are witnessing banks offering lending


There is a dearth of data on the commercial sector overall - if an independent body can provide credible information, banks will be well positioned to cater to their requirements

facilities linked to clients ‘trade-cycle’ rather than facilities where there was limited end-use monitoring,” Satyajeet Roy said.

Citibank believes that with compe-tition within the segment increasing, finances have become more accessible to small and medium units. But at the same time, given that all banks are op-erating in the same playing field (gov-erned to some extent by the common external environment), lending across both retail and commercial bank space has been cautious. “However, Citi is looking at innovative lending solu-tions for companies by mitigating risk through a combination of factors in-cluding credit insurance”.

Citi’s commercial banking unit of-fers a comprehensive range of cash management, lending, trade and treas-ury products for SME’s. This offering is on the strong foundation of a best-in-class service with each client managed by a dedicated Relationship Manager.

Specifically for MME’s, the award-winning internet banking platform (CitiDirect), the cash management/treasury solutions available coupled with the global network makes Citi a natural choice for entities with busi-nesses in multiple geographies, the bank said.

Citi recently introduced Investment & Insurance solutions for companies – bringing its on-shore and off-shore Wealth Management expertise and global product range to its commercial clients.

Despite the events of the last 18 months or so, the bank’s commercial banking arm posted higher revenues in 2009 vs. 2008 and is slated to contribute 20 per cent to the bank’s bottom line in UAE, Citi said.

Citibank says it is committed to the Small &Mid-market Enterprises seg-ment in the Middle East Region with specific focus in UAE and Bahrain where this business has shown substan-tial growth in the last 4 years. Accord-ing to the bank, this forms a part of the

Local Commercial Bank business under the umbrella of Consumer Bank where the bank enjoys an eminent position on the foundation of a dominant Cards and Wealth Management business.

The bank says its SME and MME proposition is clearly articulated in terms of client needs. The SME seg-ment looks at entities up to $50million

annual turnover with a full suite of cash management and lending products with a strong service delivery support. The MME segment caters to large local and global entities with a $50-250 mil-lion annual turnover that require Citi’s geographical spread and connectivity through its transaction services, Trade and Forex platforms.

“We continue to view the UAE as a regional hub serving the Gulf and Le-vant region, not to mention the local market, which is fast expanding and becoming more sophisticated. We real-ize that the Small & Mid Market seg-ment is one of the most under-served segments; therefore, and in line with our stated objective, it was only natural to add the Cheque/Bill Discounting & Trade Finance products. Apart from the introduction of these products, we also offer ‘value-added’ benefits like an online platform for salary payments through the Wage Protection System, mandated by the Ministry of Labour. Such bundled offering will help build stronger partnerships with our clients,” Roy added.

Satyajeet Roy


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

Risk-reward balance crucialThere are roadblocks to affordable credit for small and medium businesses, says StanChart

The biggest challenge for the SME banking sector in the UAE is to strike a balance between risk and reward in

order to achieve a situation that is mu-tually beneficial to the banks as well as small and medium businesses, says Rajesh Gupta, Acting Head of SME Banking, Standard Chartered UAE.

Banks have been extremely cau-tious in their approach to SME bank-ing. While the SME segment provides opportunities for banks to earn higher margins as compared to traditional corporate banking, it also poses poten-tially greater credit risk due to lack of credible credit information and quality of financials for SMEs. In such a sce-nario, while some banks have scaled back SME lending, others have looked to mitigate risks arising out of the giv-en challenges.

“SMEs today are struggling to get the right kind of financial support from the banking industry. The major challenge is to get affordable financing with low collateral requirement, which is different to banks’ motives to provide low risk financing at better spread. The challenge in this scenario is to strike a balance between risk and reward in order to achieve a mutually beneficial situation,” Rajesh told BBR.

It has been challenging for the SMEs to obtain finance since the global re-cession has resulted in tighter liquidity and lower credit appetite, he pointed

out. SMEs have faced pressure on their working capital lines due to piling up of inventories and the slow recovery of trade receivables. There has been a

double-negative effect for SMEs with the de-crease in bank credit.

Rajesh Gupta is responsible for the overall strategy and governance of Stand-ard Chartered’s SME business. His unit develops structured solutions to further build on Standard Chartered’s strong SME market pres-ence and increase market share. Having returned to Standard Chartered in the UAE in 2006, Rajesh cur-rently oversees a team of more than 100 em-ployees in addition to a third party sales force of more than

200. He has significantly contributed to the growth of SME Banking unit as a market leader in the UAE and contin-ues to build its profile externally.

Anything that the Government can do to improve the banks’ ability to make sound credit decisions would be helpful in increasing the appetite for SME risk

Rajesh Gupta


Prior to moving to the UAE, Rajesh worked for ABN AMRO in a number of other counties in Europe, Middle East and Asia and has vast experience in the corporate, wholesale banking and transaction banking businesses in vari-ous country, regional and head-office roles.

In the absence of a central register for creating charge over moveable/fixed assets of companies, banks are not able to create an effective charge over the assets financed, he points out. “Risk of double financing of the same asset is high. Most banks do not consider as-sets as realisable collateral due to this reason, creating a roadblock for afford-able, low risk assets”.

“Anything that the Government can do to improve our ability to make sound credit decisions would be help-ful in increasing the appetite for SME risk - transparent reporting, robust bankruptcy, legislations, perfection of collateral and most importantly, a posi-tive credit bureau.

Rajesh welcomed the government initiatives for credit guarantees, but noted that these proposed schemes as reported are significantly lagging best practice in that first-loss protection is very low. “Internationally, Hong Kong and Singapore offer 100 per cent pay-ment guarantee to banks. We would have been keen to support expanded Private –Public Partnership for fund-ing SMEs, as we do in Hong Kong and Singapore, but only if the risk-mitiga-tion was higher. The Khalifa Fund (Abu Dhabi) and MBRE (Dubai) have done some good work in this regard and we continue to work closely with them,” he said.

Referring to the difficulties for SME units to access start-up capital, he pointed out that, given the transient nature of the market, most banks will only lend after three years of establish-ment. “This makes it very hard for small and medium businesses to access start up capital. The government can help enormously here by being more aggres-sive on credit guarantees or by creating

greater access to start up capital that currently is the case,” Rajesh said.

Asked about the moves for a unified definition for the SME units, he said so far this has not resulted in a significant change for the SME industry. The pri-mary reason for this is that although there is a common definition, no sup-porting policy measures have been announced. Banks continue to use in-ternal definitions for their SME busi-nesses, which do not necessarily align with the common one.

“Policy makers have created better awareness of the contribution of SMEs to the country’s economy. They also provide critical data which helps bank-ers develop their SME strategies.

But he said a common definition at the federal level will further add impe-tus to the importance of SMEs to the economy. “Policy measures supporting SMEs will encourage banks to adopt a single definition and work in the same direction. This is key to the greater de-velopment of an important economic sector which still remains at its early stages in the region,” he said.

Rajesh says Standard Chartered con-tinued to support its customers despite the liquidity crunch. The bank has fo-cused on deepening relationships with its SME customers by providing trade and working capital solutions, he said.

“At Standard Chartered, we are committed to our customers and have remained open for business. The bank continued to hire and is expanding its Relationship Manager (RM) capacity. We have continued to lend and have not withdrawn credit lines from our customers - this has helped us achieve market share during difficult times”.

According to Rajesh, Standard Char-tered is one of the leading SME banks

in UAE as well as the region and look-ing to increase customer base by 10-12 per cent year on Standard Chartered’s SME business was launched in Oman, Bahrain and Qatar in 2009, since then the segment has expanded significantly, he said.

The bank provides a full suite of fi-nancial solutions for our customers, including§ trade & working capi-tal finance, cash management, treasury and forex services, small business loans, international trade services and so on.

“In addition to credit growth, we have also been helping customers hedge their foreign exchange risks by con-ducting seminars on trade and treasury services to educate them on the risks involved in international trading. This has helped our customers to mitigate these risks and expand their interna-tional businesses. Due to poor equi-ties environment and lack of trust in various asset classes, we have also been working on providing low risk and high yield deposit products for our SME cus-tomers,” Rajesh said.

Rajesh points out that the bank has increased its resource capabilities to provide financial solutions to custom-ers according to their needs, rather than selling off the shelf products. In line with the policy of providing services to customers closer to their work place, the bank has relocated its branches in Jebel Ali Free Zone and Deira to bigger premises, he said.

Rajesh points out that the bank has a large base of successful SMEs which have grown over the years. “As a banker, it is satisfying to see customers grow from small businesses to become renowned names, adding value to the economy and generating employment at a large scale,” he adds.

In the absence of a central register for creating charge over the assets of companies, banks are not able to create an effective charge over the assets financed


SME SPECIAL - BANKS

SME index a useful toolMove for national plan to develop sector signifies growing importance, says DIB

Dubai Islamic Bank has called for a sector-wise SME index to strengthen the growth of the small

and medium businesses. The index The SME index can be calculated as the number of SMEs in a particular indus-try as a proportion to the total number of enterprises, says Mohammed Ahmed Wajdi, SVP- Head Of Business Bank-ing, Dubai Islamic Bank.

According to him, there is a need to establish the ideal size of establish-ments within a range and their charac-teristics such as labour and capital in-tensity. The index could also be based on different

Mohammed agrees that arriving at a common definition for the SME unit has helped create further awareness among the banking and financial insti-tutions about the critical importance of the SME as the backbone of the UAE economy. There are 260,000 compa-nies in the UAE and 208,000 of them are SMEs, roughly accounting for 80 per cent of the economy, he said quot-ing sources.

There is a need to establish the ideal size of establishments within a range and their characteristics such as labour and capital intensity

Mohammed Ahmed Wajdi


The Federal Government move to drawing up a national plan to prompt the small and medium business sec-tor is indicative of the bigger role that the SME sector has been assigned, he pointed out. The Ministry of Economy has been given the mandate by the UAE Cabinet to develop this plan and the ministry is now working on a draft law for the sector, he pointed out.

The UAE has been ranked among the top 5 from 84 countries in terms of support to SMEs. Others in the top list are Bahrain, France, Singapore and Hong Kong.

Like his peers in the business, Mo-hammed feels that despite the global fi-nancial crisis, banks remain cautiously optimistic about lending to the SMEs. In a year’s time, banks are expected to provide comprehensive solution to the SMEs, a segment which is currently underserved but growing at the fastest rate, he said.

Although a well-developed SMEs sector can make significant contribu-tions to macro-economic stability and growth, the small and medium busi-nesses are relatively of high risk and with the financial crisis shaking the pillars of the corporate sector, SMEs were heavily exposed to risk and they faced increasing barriers to capital ac-cess, Mohammed said.

“On the one hand, this impedes their ability to obtain funding, and on the other, they are forced to pay higher interest” he said. Also, in times of fi-nancial crisis, the markets perform poorly, with the result that the entry of new firms becomes more limited, further compounding the problems of

Although a well-developed SMEs sector can make significant contributions to macro-economic stability and growth, the small and medium businesses are relatively of high risk

the small and medium enterprises,” he pointed out.

SMEs are a focused segment and require backing of both resources and strategy. Though quite number of banks offer products suited for the SME segment, the offerings are not yet pro-viding a competing edge, he said and pointed out that the importance given to the SMEs within any bank depends more on the overall strategy and its risk appetite.

Financing is selectively considered, however, as stipulated by the banking regulatory policies on lending SMEs based on certain criteria.

Mohammed said DIB is among the banks that have a dedicated team to cater to this sector. “Initially we had a conservative approach, which meant longer time to understand this segment in terms of profitability and risks as-sociated with it”. But he said the bank now constantly seeks to provide inno-vative Shariah-compliant products and solutions required to meet the needs of the SME customers.

DIB offers an array of customized products for the SME sector, such as working capital finance, capital ex-penditure finance, contracting finance, fleet finance, treasury and trade serv-

ices, including letters of credit and guarantees. Under the Small Business Finance category, the bank offers up to Dh500,000 for wholesalers, retailers, manufacturers etc.

Similarly, as part of the package pro-viding flexibility in managing the daily business requirements of small and me-dium businesses, DIB also offers cash management services, such as Collec-tion/ Deposit, E-Reporting, E-Payment and E-Trade.

The Al Islami Business Accounts are designed to help businesses grow by efficiently taking care of their busi-ness transaction needs and this product comes in three packages such as Al Is-lami Business Account, Al Islami Busi-ness Account Plus and Al Islami Busi-ness Account Premium. Each account package offers a unique combination of benefits, Mohammed pointed out.

Apart from these, DIB has recently introduced the ‘early bird’ approach in the SME business, which has been cat-egorized as a focused segment, where there are teams supporting various target segments of industries. These teams have the dual functions of asset and liability book management as well as cross-selling of the bank’s products, he said.


The working capital require-ment of SME borrowers has increased due to slowdown in the market while their

business volumes have gone down, ne-cessitating handholding facilities for them to tide over the crisis, according to Ashok Gupta, Chief Executive, Bank of Baroda, UAE.

“The SME sector is one of the most adversely affected by the financial cri-sis. The working capital requirement of SME borrowers has increased due to delay in sales realization owing to slow down in the market. This has resulted in an increase in demand for working capital finance from SME borrowers. On the other hand, their business vol-umes have gone down and what they need are proper hand holding facilities to tide them over the crisis. This is be-ing effectively done at Bank of Baroda as there is flexibility within the broader framework,” Ashok Gupta said.

The post-financial crisis situation has also increased the need for better monitoring of credit portfolio by the banks to avoid deterioration in the health of credit folio, he pointed out.

Gupta said policy initiatives such as arriving at a common definition for the SME unit will ensure proper identifica-tion of SMEs and facilitate easy credit flow to the SMEs.

In late 2009, the Dubai Govern-ment set a general definition for SMEs, which is differentiated by sector and takes both turnover and workforce size into account. The Dubai Chamber of Commerce considers companies with less than 10 employees micro, those

SME SPECIAL - BANKS

Bank of Baroda has always supported small and medium businesses, says CEO

SMEs need handholding to tide over crisis

with less than 20 or 24 small and those with less than 100 medium-size, pro-vided turnover is less than Dh100 mil-lion, he pointed out. The UAE banks usually consider companies small if their turnover is below $10 million a year and medium-size if it is under $25 million, but for Bank of Baroda, companies with an annual turnover of Dh100 million are classified as SME borrowers, he said.

Ashok Gupta said Bank of Baroda has always been active in support-ing and financing SMEs. The fact that other banks have also started looking at this segment is a healthy sign as SMEs will have more access to funds at more competitive rates, he said. This will help them to grow faster. “Bank of Baroda is offering financing as well as

other services to SMEs at very competitive rates,” he said.

He said that the bank is continuously introducing new products and services for SMEs to suit their require-ments. “SME units certainly will have the feeling of work-ing with the right banking partner, once they are in the company of Bank of Baroda,” he said.

With a view to providing the SMEs specialized services, Bank of Baroda recently established a spe-cialized outfit named SME Loan Fac-tory. This outfit works exactly on the principles of assembly line in the fac-tory, where there is a fixed time limit to carry out each and every activity. All the credit decisions are taken in a time bound manner, he said.

Apart from providing regular re-quirements such as Working Capital limits, Term Loans, Demand Loans etc, SME Loan Factory also offers in-novative products, keeping in view the specific requirements of SMEs such as: line of credit, equipment finance, trad-ers loan, overdraft against property for business purposes, project finance and express foan for traders, professionals and business units.

With a view to providing the SMEs specialized services, Bank of Baroda recently established a specialized outfit named SME Loan Factory

Ashok Gupta


Institutional arrangements to re-finance will greatly strengthen the hands of lenders to the small and medium businesses, accord-

ing to AJ Vidyasagar, Chief Executive Officer of State Bank of India (SBI) at DIFC.

“In India we have institutions like SIDBI, which among other things provides refinancing facilities to insti-tutions. A similar arrangement here could further strengthen the hands of the lenders who are willing to lend to this segment,” Vidyasagar said.

The UAE is home to a large number of SME units, which have played a significant part in the growth of the country and so it is gratifying to note that the Government has refocused on this segment and taken a lot of initiatives in further strengthening this activity, he pointed out. With the recession gradually coming to an

SME SPECIAL - BANKS

SBI says it continued lending to SMEs even during peak recession

Refinancing for lenders a big help

end, financial institu-tions too would adopt a more liberal approach to lending, he said.

Vidyasagar pointed out that when it comes to lenders based at the DIFC, there is a con-straint that no charge can be created on the immovable assets of the units. A change to the law putting the DIFC entities on the same level as the entities reg-ulated by Central Bank of UAE for this purpose would further enhance credit to this segment, he suggested.

The Indian bank CEO pointed out that the bank started op-AJ Vidyasagar


“Our approach to SME business is characterised by positive attitude, transparent dealings, competitive interest rates, personalized and courteous service and need-based financing”

erations during the period of recession when most banks were not willing to lend to this segment. “However, we adopted a positive attitude and pro-vided substantial credit to several SME units,” he said.

SBI has started its Corporate Bank-ing Services only last year and hence is in the process of garnering a part of the market share, he said. “Our approach to SME business is characterised by positive attitude, transparent deal-ings, competitive interest rates, per-sonalized and courteous service and need-based financing. In due course of time, we are planning to have dedi-cated personnel to cater exclusively to this segment,” Vidyasagar said.

In India, SBI has been a pioneer in SME financing and all along provided focused credit to this segment. There is a separate business group to focus exclusively on this segment. Exclu-sive Loan processing centre, exclusive branches, exclusive schemes and spe-cialized products and personnel con-tribute to the tremendous importance SBI provides to the segment.

“From DIFC branch, we have con-tinued the tradition of SBI and provid-ed substantial credit to this segment. About 60 per cent of the total credit of our branch is provided to units in the segment,” he said.

Vidyasagar pointed out that SMEs are generally considered to be in the higher risk category. Hence post the financial crisis, financial institutions

would be more careful in lending to this segment. While there would be no drying up of finance, financial in-stitutions would lay greater emphasis on the security aspect and focus more on sound financials of the company, he said.

The leading Indian banker noted that there is increasing competition among the various banks to cater to this segment. Competition would ob-viously provide greater accessibility to finance and also enables availability of credit at cheaper rates.

Referring to the government initia-tives to strengthen the SME sector, he said a common definition for SME is the first step towards focusing on the segment. This would enable all con-cerned to arrive at the exact exposure by various financial institutions on the SME segment for the time being as well as on an ongoing basis. It would provide the tool for the authorities to monitor the exposure at regular inter-

vals, he said.“In short it would provide the SME

segment a distinct place in the scheme of things,” he pointed out.

SBI offers the whole gamut of prod-ucts required by SME units for their operations, Vidyasagar said. These in-clude trade finance facilities like issu-ing, advising, confirmation and nego-tiation of LCS and also Trust Receipts. SBI also issues bank guarantees, apart from collection and negotiation of all types of bills and provision of financ-ing at both ends of the trade transac-tion by sanctioning suppliers credit as well as buyers credit.

The bank offers the full range of working capital credit facilities wheth-er they are fund-based or non-fund based, he said. It also provides term loans also for setting up plant and ma-chinery, project expansion, import of capital goods etc. The bank even offers syndicated services wherever the ticket size is big, he added.


COVER STORYSME SPECIAL - COMPANIES

European heritage adapted to Middle EastAt Baker & Spice, they not only know and love the food, they know how to grow it as well

European heritage, adapted to the Middle East to create a unique version of local soul food. That’s how Baker &

Spice describe themselves. “We know and love our food”.

At Baker & Spice, they not only know and love the food; they also know how to grow the food, cook it and of course serve.

The menu represents an exciting daily journey through the farms and markets of the UAE and the region, constantly changing with the seasons and availability of fresh locally grown and mainly organic ingredients. What diners get there is an ‘experience with food in its purest and freshest form’.

Baker & Spice started as a concept in London in 1995 by Yael Mejia. It was set up as an artisan food shop mak-ing everything in their kitchens. The London’s iconic food shop has been brought to the UAE by Kharafi Glo-bal, a Kuwait-based F&B company owned by Kuwaiti nationals Waleed Al Kharafi and Haidar Al Naqeeb.

The B&S spirit arrived in the emir-ates when Baker & Spice Dubai opened in January 2009. Located in the Souk Al Bahar, it is a large dining and retail space, including a terrace overlook-ing the Dubai Fountain at the base of the Burj Khalifa. The restaurant can seat 150 diners and offers a breakfast, lunch, dinner and retail menu.

“Mashreq has been with us from the first step of entering the Dubai market and we are extremely pleased with this partnership”

“I have to say it’s very challenging and at the same time encouraging to see what exactly can B&S add to the market here. The food industry is mas-sive here with international brands that have been around for a very long time. But we believe that B&S with its unique combination in its offering can add so much to the diversity in the market here, build a reputation for its own and stand out,” says Mohamad El Chehimi, Dubai General Manager .

“Baker & Spice is considered one of the best restaurants serving fresh and quality food in town. The concept the-ory is unique; hence it’s difficult to lo-cate a restaurant business with similar standards. The first priority is to look at what is in season locally and within the region, and in peak condition. Sourc-ing food this way means that we are minimizing our food miles and carbon footprint, and the journey from field to plate is significantly shorter,” he points out.

Mohammed says that the aim is to establish a strong food retail brand in Dubai, before taking it across the Mid-

dle East. The market is big and full of promising opportunities and our line of business is booming. “Once we are done with Dubai expansion, we will further expand in the region”.

“We are planning to open our cen-tral kitchen and at least two more units. Our expansion plans are huge in this market and we look forward to grow further and further,” he said. But the priority for the time being is to establish a strong brand presence in Dubai and expand in the region. “We look forward to tap in various markets, when the op-portunity arises”.

Asked about the brand’s experience with their bankers, the general man-ager said they are “pleased with the level of service and products offered by Mashreq. This greatly assists in stream-lining our business, hence its growth. Mashreq has been with us from the first step of entering the Dubai market and we are extremely pleased with this part-nership. I am certain that Mashreq’s continuous support will result in fur-ther growth and success of B&S,” he said.


SME SPECIAL - COMPANIES

39

Benefiting from oil boom

Starting with a 12-sqft shop, do-ing repair of motor vehicles in 1973, the ESMA group today is a prominent player in the busi-

ness of supplying and servicing various industrial and engineering products for the oil and gas industry, marine on-shore and offshore, process industries and the petrochemical sector.

The company was founded by Narenda (Nari) Odhrani and his broth-er. Odhrani came to Dubai after com-pleting training as mechanical engi-neer to pursue a career in maintenance and repair of vehicles. In those days, 4-wheel drives were the main mode of commuting between oil installations and the rest of the country, so the busi-ness did make sense. But according to Yogesh Odhrani, the son who joined the business in 2002, within one year, the repair business got stuck in a rough patch and it was around this time that the oil boom was happening. So, the Odhrani brothers sensed a great op-portunity there and plunged into the oil fields supply business. That proved to be the all-important break.

The main activity of the new venture was trading of goods, buying llocally from regional companies and selling to major American companies that were involved in the drilling of oil wells all over the country

“Soon after, we established relation-ships directly with manufacturers who

Dubai firm comes a long way from modest origin

were looking to partner with com-panies that excelled with knowledge about the oil and gas industry,” recalls Yogesh.

Within two years, the operations shifted to a premises five times larger and an even larger stocking location was hired for holding the inventory. As the business further grew, the loca-tion was again shifted to a facility three times higher and incorporated a ware-house, workshop and offices. By the early eighties, the operations expanded to Abu Dhabi, with the addition of sev-eral other locations.

“We kept reinvesting back into our business and initiated direct imports from the manufacturers and building inventory of the products. Our first customer, Weatherford, an American company involved in drilling oil wells, encouraged us to develop our business to provide services on site rather than continuing with trading. Working with Weatherford and several other local and international companies, e.g. AD-NOC, Dowell Schlumberger etc was an enjoyable experience,” he said.

Initially the business was estab-lished in Dubai followed by expansion towards Abu Dhabi in 1981 and the ad-

dition of several locations to the busi-ness.

In 1995, the company moved its headquarters to Dubai’s Al Quoz area and in 2001, the first overseas branch was established in Azerbaijan, which was followed by another expansion of the Abu Dhabi operations into a facil-ity four times larger. Three years later, the company opened its second over-seas branch in Kazakhstan and moved the corporate office to Jebel Ali Free Zone. Also added was a new location in Deira.

According to Yogesh, the business has gained reputation thanks to the support from its loyal customers all over the region. “With excellent cus-tomers and the growing number of pro-fessionals in this industry, our company has achieved a leading position in our industry, and this has received great ap-preciation from out clients.”

Yogesh says ESMA, which banks with HSBC, is constantly adding new dimensions to the business. “We are considering several options for expan-sion, one of which is the establishment of a manufacturing company for Sys-tems & Equipment related to the oil and gas industry,” he disclosed.

ESMA, which banks with HSBC, is constantly adding new dimensions to the business


Dominant player in IT, network security

Dubai-based Spectrum Group has grown into one of the leading IT Network and Security training cen-

tres in the region offering SMB and large enterprises with training, con-sultancy and infrastructure support to make best use of technology.

Spectrum Group is a dominant player in the IT & network security space – and given the level of spe-cialisation required for the work and the sensitivity involved working with various clients (including Govt inves-tigative agencies), there are only a few names offering such solutions in the UAE today. The group says its USP is clearly the ability to deliver solutions for the most complex issue through a high-performing team. The group won the Your Business SME Award for Best Use of Technology, for 2008.

The group was founded by Ajay Singh Chauhan, an alumnus of one of India’s leading engineering institute IIT, Mumbai, who worked with a lead-ing IT company in the Middle East”. Having gained experience and exper-tise over a number of years, he saw that the region had tremendous potential for specialised businesses and decided to become an entrepreneur.

The group started as a training and technology solution provider in 2004 and today has four companies under it. The group provides training to or-ganizations such as Microsoft, Juniper, Guidance software etc. Spectrum has partnerships with Juniper Networks & Foundry Networks as their authorized education partners and has a state-of-the-art Lab facility in a new premise of the Knowledge Village.

It was very challenging to estab-lish credibility quickly and to make

prospective clients (and banks) be-lieve that the company could deliver even the most complex IT security issue, says Chauhan. But he says he was lucky: having hired a set of highly competent and committed individuals, the group has grown consistently over the past 5 years.

Over the last 5 years, the group has had a CAGR of 35 per cent. The growth has continued despite the global finan-cial crisis and the group is confident of maintaining the growth trajectory for next 24-36 months.

According to Chauhan, the group is looking at Asia and India in particular for expansion. Similarly, it sees scope for expansion into the Middle East through the UAE operations. The na-ture of the services provided does not need a brick-and-mortar presence for

expansion, he points out. “Organic expansion is the way forward. We could look at some JVs in the Middle East. The vision is to clearly add value for the customers and thereby to the group,” he said.

Asked about how his bank helped the company grow, he said the natu-ral fallback was to go to Citibank where a personal account existed for the past so many years. “The bank’s commercial banking arm was quick to move and offered something ini-tially, which was not completely as per requirement but sufficient to make a start. Since then, the relation-ship has strengthened and facilities have grown as well. It would be only fair to say that a part of growth of the Group can be attributed to Citibank’s help,” Chauhan said.

“It would be only fair to say that a part of growth of the Group can be attributed to Citibank’s help”

Ajay Singh Chauhan

COVER STORYSME SPECIAL - COMPANIES


Safe and low-cost healthcare

Dawit Gebreegziabher, founder of Medica Phar-ma Enterpises, has always been fascinated by the

power of medicine in prevention of diseases. He has been in the UAE for the past two decades.

Coming from Ethiopia, a country which aspires for improved Human Development Indicators, he works with Ministry of Health in Ethiopia as part of the ministry’s initiative to provide safe and low-cost healthcare services for the people. Gebreegziabher was keen to give something back to so-ciety and do something for the people of Ethiopia.

The origin of Medica Pharma Enter-prises can be traced to this thought. The company has since established itself as a leading supplier to the Ministry of Health in Ethiopia. Having had long-lasting successful relationships with leading suppliers around the world, the company is now looking at geographic expansion within Africa.

The company has been growing at a rate of 50 per cent year-on-year for the last few years. “Even in 2009, when there was serious recession all around, our business grew at the same pace. The trend is expected to continue well into the next decade,” says Gebreegzia-bher, who is immensely pleased with the achievements of his small venture.

The Medica Pharma Enterprises founder says Citibank understands the company’s need in terms of the specific requirements

‘Relationship with bank based on credible Trust’

He attributes the success of the com-pany to its unique business model. “The company chose to do business in areas which offered huge latent opportunity. The competitive landscape is very dif-ferent to what you see in the Middle

East or for that matter in any other developed market. The opportunity in healthcare is unlimited,” he ex-plains.

According to Gebreegziabher, the company is looking at two more countries in Africa where it wants to explore similar business oppor-tunities. However, this is at an early stage yet, he says.

The Medica Pharma founder says Citibank understands the com-pany’s need in terms of the specific requirement for Trade Finance fa-cilities. Citibank’s global profile has ensured that the company is able to seamlessly link the various points involved for such trade transactions end-to-end, he said.

“Our relationship with the bank is based on credible trust, mutual re-spect and enthusiasm. Also, I would like to specifically mention the round-the-clock service that the company has received from Citibank staff,” Ge-breegziabher said.

Dawit Gebreegziabher



A well-brewed successDeliver exceptional coffee in

every cup…from cart to ki-osk to café…again and again and again: this is what Coffee

Planet founder Richard Jones set out to do about five years ago. Today, his com-pany sells 10,000 cups of coffee every day through its outlets and has extended its presence into the hotel, office, foodservice and catering sectors.

With a turnover of Dh25 million, which is projected to increase to 45 mil-lion in the next couple of years, Coffee Planet is today the most widely distribut-ed coffee brand in the UAE. And ADCB, which financed much of this growth, can take pride in helping Richard Jones create a great success story.

Before he came to the UAE, Richard was a founding member of a healthcare start up business, Ludlow Street Health-care Group, in the UK in 2004 which cur-rently has 700 employees. According to his bio, he worked in some of the world’s leading blue chip companies such as Mars, Danone and Price Waterhouse and has a wealth of knowledge and experience gained from his 15 years of financial, mar-keting and commercial corporate roles.

Richard explains the idea behind Cof-fee Planet: “We had a sense that coffee drinkers deserved better than they were getting and that as we were not con-strained in our thinking, we could bring something new to the market by only us-ing the best Arabica coffee beans and the most advanced technology. The UAE with its ambitions and growth potential was a perfect match for our coffee idea.”

He says the beginning was very diffi-cult as Coffee Planet was a new concept. “A gourmet fresh bean, fresh milk coffee in a convenience store environment on petrol forecourts had never been done in Middle East and nobody gave us much chance to succeed. But we knew that once people tried our coffee, they would love it. All we had to do was make it available in as many locations as we could for our


limited investment. We had limited pri-vate funds to start the business and had to run trials for 6 months to prove the model. It took three years to get any third party funding for our business”.

“Coffee Planet operates in many mar-ket segments in order that the consumer can drink our coffee at any time of the day in any place where they are. We remain the most innovative and best quality cof-fee provider in the Middle East and our awareness among consumers is growing rapidly. We are the most geographically widespread coffee brand in the UAE as we are available in every corner of the coun-try. We are starting to open up cafes in traditional locations like shopping malls and office towers but with a very unique interior design feel – we call it a ‘coffee bar’. It is a coffee shop revolution!” claims Richard.

Two years ago, the company built its own roastery facility in the UAE, which according to Richards, was ‘to guarantee the freshness of our coffee for all our cus-tomers’. Today, it is the largest roaster of specialty coffee in the Middle East. The company says it is continuously seeking new market channels and has a develop-ment plan for retail; cafes in Dubai and

Abu Dhabi for the next 5 years. “We have taken more control over our

supply chain and reduced our cost base by linking up directly with coffee growers in different regions of the world to supply us with the green coffee beans for us to roast. We are also developing cashless vending options for office and residential tower lo-cations,” he says.

“We believe the Coffee Planet brand has great potential for expansion into the rest of the Middle East and Asia. We have always emphasised that we are proud this is a brand that was born in the UAE and can be exported to others countries in the region. Consumers know it well and trust it to deliver a great coffee all of the time. So, provided we find the right partners and the right levels of investment and funding we have a great chance to grow our sales and brand awareness abroad,” Richard asserts.

The company already has a franchise business, although it is in the early stages. Coffee Planet now operates in Oman and is currently running trials in Malaysia, Pakistan, Jordan and Syria. “We are even investigating a joint venture in the USA. We believe choosing the right partner is critical for success in new markets and so to become a member of the Coffee Planet family takes the right attitude as well as money and desire for success. The response in Oman has been fantastic and we expect the roll out to continue into more conven-ience store locations and a cafe site in the next 6 months,” he says.

Richard says ADCB responded to the company’s request for banking and finance facilities nearly two years ago and since then the two sides have developed a very good relationship. “It is important that a banking partner understands and has faith in the business and that it provides all the necessary facilities to allow the business to flourish. We believe ADCB is such a bank. By being responsive to our needs, by pro-viding solutions that work for us at a cost we can afford, the ADCB bank is helping to project our business forward,” he said.

Richard Jones



‘Bank understands our vision’

“Relationships with banks are like chil-dren, once they are born you must nur-

ture them,” says Ara Pierre Keusseyan, Managing Director, Polimar Group, while describing the role banks play in helping businesses grow.

“Dubai Islamic Bank has contrib-uted to our growth and shown us it un-derstands our vision and stands ready to support us,” he points out.

Polimar is a technical trading, spe-cialty manufacturing and consulting group of companies headquartered in Sharjah. Founded in 1963, Polimar was initially involved in the design and fabrication of specialty metallic struc-tures, and the supply and service of equipment and machinery.

The company was founded by Ara’s father, the late Pierre Keusseya, in 1963. “After finishing a temporary con-tract with the company that employed him to support with the completion of a project for the British Army in Shar-jah, my father went to say good bye to his friend the late Sheikh Khalid Bin Mohammad Al Qassimi, who suggest-ed to him to stay on in the country as the future was looking very promising. Indeed despite the proverbial ups and

“Dubai Islamic Bank has contributed to our growth and shown us it understands our vision and stands ready to support us”

In its own field, the company is at the forefront, says Polimar MD

downs of the economy, the Emirates has prospered under the wise leader-ship of their highnesses the rulers,” Ara Pierre said.

But the beginning seems to have been tough, he said. “From the stories I have heard from my father and from situations I have lived as a child, it was as tough as one should expect from any new venture, especially when the econ-omy is on the fast forward mode”.

Asked about the growth of the com-pany, Ara said there is growth in size and know-how and there is growth in qualification. “The short and medium term outlook should focus on the first type of growth which is related to the size of the market, the share the com-pany can have of that market and the enablers to acquire a competitive edge over similar or competing businesses.

“The longer term outlook should focus on the second type of growth as

this will enable the company to diver-sify successfully in areas that will offer growth opportunities in the early stag-es of the lifecycle of that new business,” he pointed out.

The managing director said that the company operates in various automo-tive specialty fields: technical trading for refinish; business to business and retail services for coachwork, body and paint; precision mould and collectible manufacturing as well as retailing for motorsport enthusiasts.

“In the fields we operate in, the com-pany’s standing is at the forefront”.

On possible expansion plans, he said it depended on favourable mar-ket conditions. “Every good company should have plans to expand. However, we believe that this should happen only when the right opportunity and conducive market conditions present themselves”.


Beginning operations as a trading store for electronic products and home appli-ances in 1970s, the Sabah

Group of companies today encom-passes a number of activities, such as manufacturing, construction and steel fabrication, trading in automo-bile spare parts and real estate.

The company was founded to-gether by UAE national Mohammed Ramadan Moosa Sajwani and Joseph Kuttummel from India.

Now the group has a portfolio of nine companies under it. Beginning with trading activities, the company started a manufacturing line with an initial investment of Dh3 million for the production of car radiators in the year 2000, with initial sales of Dh3.5 million a year.

“Being a manufacturing company, we faced a lot of problems during the initial periods, particularly in the dis-tribution of the product. But gradu-ally, we started grabbing market share and today the company’s sales exceed

Bank was a major support, says Sabah Group MD

From electronic shop to manufacturing group

“We have grown with Bank of Baroda and our relationship of 33 years is a reflection of a mutually satisfying business relationship”

Dh60 million,” says Joseph Kuttum-mel, managing director.

“Our growth is multidimensional, both in the number of units as well as sales and today we are leaders in car radiator sales and in a commanding position,” Joseph said.

According to Joseph, the group has been dealing with Bank of Bar-oda for the past 33 years. “Bank of Baroda has contributed significantly to the growth of the company. We have a total exposure of Dh70 mil-lion and also a deposit relationship of Dh30 million with the bank. Timely approvals and proper financing as per our requirements were the major

support we received from the bank and their products are suited to their customers’ financial needs,” Joseph pointed out.

Referring to the future plans of the company, Joseph said the com-pany has now started manufacture of copper and brass car radiators and the demand of the products is increasing. The company has also es-tablished a new aluminium radiator project in SAIF Zone, Sharjah named Sabah Radiator Industries.

“We have grown with Bank of Bar-oda and our relationship of 33 years is a reflection of a mutually satisfying business relationship,” Joseph said.




From a modest beginning as a gar-ment trading company operating

out of a small rented office and storage facility in 1998, Pan Global Trading has today grown into a major international trading house, with its portfolio cover-ing metals, foodstuff and garments.

The company initially started by im-porting garments from countries like India and selling it in Gulf and Africa. Today, the company’s trading operations span a large number of destinations such as China, Singapore, Vietnam, India, Pakistan, Morocco, Mauritania, Senegal, Togo, Liberia, Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman, South Africa, the US etc.

With the expansion and diversifica-

Over a century old, Shrenuj is a name to reckon with in the inter-

national diamond and jewellery trade. It is a DTC sightholder company.

A sightholder is a company on the Diamond Trading Company’s (DTC) list of authorized bulk purchasers of rough diamonds.

From its modest beginning in 1906, the company today is among the lead-ing manufacturers of gems and jewel-lery and reputed brand in diamond in-dustry. Shrenuj as a group has branches in 14 countries, with a retail network in Hong Kong and India.

Shrenuj DMCC, Dubai started its operation in 2006 under the leadership of Smit Kothari. He is promoter director of Shrenuj DMCC and has been instru-mental in setting up business operations

Small garment trading company becomes top-leaguer in scrap metal

Company is among the leading manufacturers of gems and jewellery

On way to a billion-dirham company

Shrenuj: Reputed diamond brand

tion of trade, the company’s turnover kept increasing manifold.

“Till the year 2003, our company re-corded steady but modest growth and the turnover used to be in the range of Dh40 million. But with the expan-sion of operations, the current turnover is about Dh525 million. We are now among the largest exporters of metal scrap (in containerized segment)”, says Managing Director Anil Kapur.

Kapur says the company’s vision now is to increase the turnover to a billion dirhams in the next couple of years.

Anil Kapur says SBI has helped the company by providing enhanced credit facilities as result of which the company could further increase the turnover. “We find SBI quite helpful and sensitive to our needs and requirements. We look forward to a long and fruitful relation-ship with the bank,” he said.

“We find SBI quite helpful and sensitive to our needs and requirements. We look forward to a long and fruitful relationship with the bank”

“We as Shrenuj DMCC are proud to be a pioneer client of SBI, Dubai and we really appreciate the services”

all over Middle East. In a short span of four years, Shrenuj DMCC has achieved sales of more than $60 million.

“State Bank of India (SBI) has been a partner with Shrenuj for many decades. We have enjoyed the best services in India as well as overseas. We as Shrenuj DMCC are proud to be pioneer client of SBI, DIFC, Dubai and we really ap-preciate the services provided by each and every staff member of SBI, DIFC, Dubai,” said Smit Kothari.

“We are witness to the success of SBI, DIFC, in short span of their incorpora-

tion. The growth in such global financial meltdown can be credited to long and aggressive vision of CEO, AJ Vidyasagar, and his team,” he said.

The company praised the bank man-agement’s efforts to keep the branch op-erational on all seven days a week to give uninterrupted services to their customers and cited this as an example of the hard work and dedication of the staff.

“We are confident that we would see new heights achieved by SBI Dubai in the years to come and would love to be always associated with them,” Kothari said.


COVER STORY

46

REAL ESTATE

Breakthrough technology, cut-ting edge innovation and cre-ativity are undoubtedly the hallmarks of Burj Khalifa,

which is the new landmark on Dubai’s skyline. But the Dubai World Trade Centre, which the world’s tallest tower has replaced as the Dubai landmark, had exactly the same attributes, says

Man who oversaw construction of Dubai World Trade Centre reminisces on a journey of mission

Passion for breakthrough technologies

Trade Centre is one of Dubai’s most eco-friendly buildings even today as the exterior of the tower is almost maintenance-free and the very restricted use of glass on the building making it highly energy-efficient

Dr JR Gangaramani

By K Raveendran


in 1974 was the challenge of work-ing on the tallest ‘hi-tech’ building in the Middle East and a sign of things to come. He had just landed in Dubai, armed with an Indian engineering de-gree and three years of work experience back home. But it was a great time to arrive as the UAE federation had been founded just three years prior to that and the country had just commenced its programme of accelerated develop-ment and transformation under the vi-sion of the late President Sheikh Zayed Bin Sultan Al Nahyan.

Gangaramani recalls his experienc-es of interacting with the late Sheikh Rashid bin Saeed Al Maktoum, the then Ruler of Dubai, who took great interest in the construction of the project and visited the site almost daily, sometimes making more than one round in a day.

“Suppose he suggested a change to the way something was being planned, he would make a second visit later in the day to see how the change was shaping up. Whether it was construction, engi-neering or anything else, Sheikh Rashid insisted on bringing the latest technolo-gies to Dubai”.

Sheikh Rashid was also very con-scious about costs and insisted that the work be done within the allocated budget. For instance, the number of apartments in the residential build-ings adjacent to the Trade Centre was reduced by a few units so that the total cost remained within the originally al-located budget, he pointed out.

Gangaramani is the proud owner of a personal collection of photos of the World Trade Centre site complex, track-ing its progress through various stages,

Sheikh Rashid, the then Ruler of Dubai, took great interest in the construction of the Trade Centre and visited the site almost daily, sometimes making more than one round in a day

the man who oversaw the construction of Dubai’s most admired structure all these years.

“The World Trade Centre was so futuristic during its time that it had set new benchmarks in architecture, construction and engineering feats”, says Dr JR Gangaramani, who was the project engineer for the construction of Dubai World Trade Centre. Ask him about green technology, he would say the Trade Centre is one of Dubai’s most eco-friendly buildings even today.

The exterior of the tower is almost maintenance-free and the very re-stricted use of glass on the building makes it highly energy-efficient. The structure itself, though very elegant, is most cost-effective as it is straight and simple, compared to some of the ir-regular and twisted shapes of buildings of today, which add monstrous propor-tions to construction costs. The Trade Centre was built using precast, pre-segmental, pre-stressed technology, a first of its kind in the Gulf in its time and the technology saved time, labour and cost.

In fact, the biggest attraction for the young Gangaramani to join the project

(From left to right) Sheikh Maktoum Bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai, HH Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of UAE and Ruler of Dubai, and Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid AL Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai with Dr JR Gangaramani


including some of the earthwork for the construction.

Once the Trade Centre got complet-ed, Gangaramani was in search of other challenging responsibilities, which took him to Al Ain, where he was appointed to take charge of the Al Ain Flyover project. This was another project that saw the use of breakthrough technolo-gies. He says that Al Ain, characterised by vast spaces, the greenery and water of the oasis as well as the warmth of the residents, connected well with his disposition, which prompted him to set up home there. It was here that he set up his own construction company Al Fara’a in 1980, first partnering with the company that originally employed him and later buying out the business in full from them.

Gangaramani says that as an un-known entrepreneur who enjoyed a good rapport with the community, he set out to craft his life mission as ‘a conduit of knowledge, resources, state of the art technology and investment into the country’. Soon Al Fara’a was managing around 12 projects. Unlike most entrepreneurial ‘breakthroughs’, where one large achievement takes one

Gangaramani set out to craft his life mission as ‘a conduit of knowledge, resources, state of the art technology and investment into the country’

on to the road of success, Al Fara’a was getting a ‘barrage of breakthroughs’.

Nearly 30 years on, Al Fara’a now employs 18,000 people and has a pres-ence in Dubai, Abu Dhabi, Al Ain and Sharjah, apart from its international footprint. The Al Fara’a Integrated Con-struction Group today spans property development, construction and related services as well as manufacturing and fabrication industries across the GCC and Asia.

Al Fara’a Properties, which has launched five projects ranging from commercial to residential in a Dh10-billion property portfolio, lat year com-pleted the handover of its pilot project, Le Grand Chateau in Jumeirah Village, Dubai, six months ahead of schedule. The project was also awarded best devel-opment recognition by CNBC Arabia.

Al Fara’a General Contracting, li-censed as a Special Grade Company

by the UAE Government, has achieved a track record spanning multiple typed of projects of different magnitudes. The construction and related services seg-ment of the Al Fara’a Group includes an investment arm, mechanical, electrical and plumbing supply and services (Al Sabbah Electro-Mechanical), exterior and interior finishing as and even precast and steel structures.

In terms of manufacturing and fab-rication, Belgium Aluminium and Glass employs cutting edge technology in its factories, that combined are arguable the largest of their kind in the UAE. Unibe-ton Ready Mix, backed by world class leading technology manufactures and optimises ready mix concrete to suit any requirement and is the leading concrete manufacturer in the Gulf.

The Dh3.5 billion turnover group prides itself on its remarkable results in the realm of rewarding career growth and the personal development of its em-ployees with a wide scope of training, recreational and developmental activi-ties spanning multiple disciplines. The Group has also prioritised corporate so-cial responsibility investment with the formation of its Al Fara’a Foundation that focuses on delivering sustainable long term solutions to meet the needs of its stakeholders.

Gangaramani says he has adopted a five pillar approach to his philanthropic efforts. These pillars are care (helping vulnerable communities through com-munity service), empowerment (devel-oping communities and networks to facilitate optimal growth by means of education and development), growth (contributing to the sustainable econom-ic advancement of our communities via entrepreneurial successes), challenge (in-spiring community members to progres-sively reach for new heights with various sporting, educational and recreational sponsorships) and nurture (enabling communities to flourish through a last-ing environmental focus).

Dr JR Gangaramani with Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Ruler’s representative, Abu Dhabi and Deputy Chairman, Abu Dhabi Executive Council


The President of India recently conferred a second award in one year on Al Fara’a Group frounder Dr JR Gangaramani in recognition of his community invest-ment, business achievements and his role in improved UAE-India relations. He is only the fifth UAE resident and the sixth person in GCC to receive this honour.

The President’s award, named Padma Shri, has been bestowed on Dr Gangaramani in recognition for his social work and business achievements. The prestigious Padma Shri Award, which was first conferred in 1954, is a civilian award given to an Indian for outstanding contribution or achievement in a chosen field. Catego-ries include, among others, Business Excellence, Public Life and Social Service. Nominations to the award are made by State Governments, Union Territory adminis-trations, ministries and other governmental bodies.

Top honours from President of IndiaDr Gangaramani’s Al Fara’a Integrated Construc-

tion Group is a conglomerate of 10 construction related companies that collectively employ 18,000 people.

Last year in January, Dr Gangaramani was be-stowed the Pravasi Bharatiya Samman Award, which is given to notable persons of Indian origin outside of India, by the President of India.

Humbled by the appreciation of his achieve-ments in the realm of entrepreneurial success, role in strengthening Indo-UAE ties and his efforts at caring for the communities in which he operates, Dr Gangaramani thanked the Rulers of the UAE for their economic wisdom in creating an environment condu-cive to realising one’s dreams and further reiterated his commitment to serving the people of the UAE.

COVER STORY


WEALTH

Private banks have spent the last 18 months dealing with one of the most difficult pe-riods in modern financial

history. A ‘perfect storm’ of asset-price declines and the near or actual col-lapse of some of the best-known wealth management firms has altered the be-haviour of clients, prompting them to move into less risky financial instru-ments that are much less profitable for the banks. All of this has pushed rev-enue levels down by 25 to 30 per cent. As an added challenge, governments are cracking down on their wealthy citizens’ untaxed offshore accounts, forcing many private banks to find new value propositions.

An industry in transitionOver the last few months, Booz & Company has taken a closer look at the world’s leading wealth management markets by conducting in-depth in-terviews with more than 140 bankers, advisors, and regulators in 15 markets around the world, to understand the core drivers of private banking, while forming a perspective on the new rules of the industry and what it means for private bankers to adapt to the new re-alities ‘after the storm’

While the financial crisis has jolted the private banking industry, three fundamental characteristics of the in-dustry remain intact:

Wealth management industry loses 25 to 30% of revenue since the outbreak of financial crisis

Private banking after the perfect storm

Private banks have continued to deliver profits and many banks are starting to move strongly into emerging markets, especially in places like Asia and India

By Peter Vayanos & Dr Daniel Diemers

1. Fundamentally geared for growthWhile world wealth generally expands at the rate of GDP growth, the number of high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs), defined as people with more than US$1 million in investable assets, has been growing at anywhere from 1.5 to three times the rate of GDP. The increase in HNWIs is creating substantial wealth. The financial crisis of 2008 took its toll on HNWIs as massive devaluations hit all major asset categories and geogra-phies. 2. Cyclical in natureThere is no question that the revenue of private banks is highly correlated with the performance of equity markets. This cyclicality is no surprise; revenue in pri-vate banking depends heavily on trans-action volumes and asset-based fees. As a change appears unlikely for the in-dustry’s revenue-generating model, this correlation likely will hold. For the near term, that means the industry’s revenues will depend on the extent to which the markets can continue the rally they started in March 2009.

3. Profitable even in difficult timesSince the beginning of this financial crisis, the wealth management industry has lost 25 to 30 per cent of its revenue because of a lower asset base, cautious market behaviour, and a shift toward low-margin financial products. Yet more than 95 per cent of private banks analysed worldwide were able to deliver positive pretax profits during this peri-od. Private banks’ persistent profitabil-ity is a reflection of the speed at which they can adjust their operating models to align them with current business conditions.

Change levers While the underlying dynamics are fundamentally promising for private banks, the industry must navigate through a number of significant chang-es going forward:

1. Tectonic shift in global wealth dis-tributionWhile the majority of industrialised countries are just beginning to recover


North America: North America continues to hold a significant share of the world’s HNWIs and UHNWIs (ul-tra-high-net-worth individuals). Slow growth in productivity and in North America’s economies is expected over the short to medium term, limiting the overall growth in asset markets and in the number of wealthy households.

Many emerging-market countries are also expected to become more po-litically stable and thus offer good in-vestment opportunities. This will cre-ate another disincentive to bring the new wealth offshore.

2. The end of the tax-induced offshore business modelWhile the offshore business has tra-ditionally been an essential part of private banking, it has recently come under increasing scrutiny, especially due to widespread perceptions that it enables tax evasion. In tandem with the recent G20 decision to crack down on tax havens, offshore locations are in-creasingly implementing standards of cooperation on tax evasion and soften-ing their strict banking secrecy rules.. This change will presumably accelerate the crisis-induced fundamental chang-es in the competitive landscape and will affect especially private banking in traditional offshore locations.

3. More pragmatism in client behav-iourClient behaviour changed during the crisis. The changes have come in phases and have created significant challenges for private banks. The first phase came after the market collapsed and clients lost money in late 2008 and early 2009. In the wake of this implosion, clients shifted their assets toward simple,

transparent, liquidity-oriented prod-ucts with lower margins. Structured products in particular fell from favour, and clients largely retreated from risky and complex asset classes. A main cause of this behaviour was the reduced trust that clients had in banks, products, and relationship managers—a problem worsened by the fact that relationship managers, in turn, did not trust their own product providers anymore. The result is that clients have become more hesitant to delegate and have shifted as-sets from managed portfolios to nondis-cretionary and self-directed mandates.

4. Pressure on costs will endureMost private banks have responded to diminishing revenue pools by remov-ing costs from their operations in a va-riety of ways. Although the rebound in financial markets since March 2009 has helped private banks to stabilise their top lines, profitability will remain un-der pressure for several reasons:

Transaction volumes during the re-•cent market recovery have stayed quite low, and asset allocation re-mains biased toward low risk asset classes.Clients have become wary of com-•plex, non transparent or expensive products. Many clients have shifted assets from •managed accounts to self directed mandates, lowering the profitability of their accounts.The relatively high-margin offshore •assets will gradually transform into local onshore assets, at far lower price points.Compliance requirements and the •need to cope with operational and reputational risks will increase the cost of doing business.

Private banks have continued to deliver profits and many banks are starting to move strongly

into emerging markets, especially in places like Asia and India

from the financial crisis, most emerg-ing markets have already returned to pre-crisis growth rates. We believe that these varying rates of recovery will persist for the next few years, shifting the global wealth concentration to the East.

Latin America: Prior to the cri-sis, private banking in Latin America was experiencing double-digit annual growth, with clients increasingly de-manding onshore/offshore conver-gence and open architectures, which provide clients with access to best-of-breed products from top suppliers in each asset class. Though 2009 was chal-lenging in the region, Latin America’s immediate future looks brighter as its equity markets pick up, creating wealth through IPOs and M&A transactions.

Middle East and Africa: Countries rich in natural resources will likely return to accelerated wealth creation even before the global economy fully recovers. Large government-led infra-structure projects will further boost the regional economies and many HNW and UHNW clients will benefit either directly or indirectly from these projects.

Asia/Pacific: Led by China and India, the Asia/Pacific region will be where most new HNWIs will be creat-ed, driven by the strength of the under-lying economies and a strong entrepre-neurial spirit. By the end of 2011, nearly 3.6 million HNWIs are expected to live in the Asia/Pacific region, up from 2.57 million in 2008.

Europe: GDP growth rates for key European markets are expected to re-main flat for the next few years. A sig-nificant shift of assets among European countries is likely, due to the new regu-latory regimes.


5. New business models taking shapeThere is a distinct sense that open product architecture solutions will pre-dominate in the future, with clients de-manding access to best-of-breed prod-ucts from top suppliers in each asset class. The integrated operating model served clients poorly in the financial crisis, eliminating the possibility of an objective intermediary and increasing the moral hazard of selling the struc-tured products that were profitable for the banks but risky for clients. In the wake of that trust-shattering period, private banks need to further demon-strate their expertise in the areas of risk profiling, asset allocation, product selection, and due diligence. This also means that the model of the integrated bank will be more closely scrutinised than in the past.

The new imperative for successWhile long-term prospects for the pri-vate banking industry are distinctly positive, private banks need to adapt their business models to the new reali-ties: 1. Seriously commit to emerging mar-ketsThe expansion and evolving behaviour of the HNWI population in China, In-dia, and the Middle East will require private banks to operate in new ways in these markets. Wealth management players with global ambitions need an emerging market strategy to capture the large wealth expected to be gen-erated in these regions in the coming years. They will also need to acquire or develop a deep understanding of, and access to, local investment opportuni-ties as new wealth is increasingly in-vested locally.

2. Become a declared multi-shoring playerThe tax-neutral, offshore private bank-ing proposition of many domiciles will not survive the current regulatory pressure and offshore clients are likely to withdraw part of their funds and in-crease local investments. Private banks

Most private banks have responded to diminishing revenue pools by removing costs from their operations in a variety of ways

will have to proactively approach and support offshore clients whose gov-ernments are applying pressure on tax-optimised accounts. The goal is to serve as a truly trusted advisor and ho-listic wealth manager, helping clients repatriate their money and shift assets to onshore locations, thereby keeping assets within the bank, even if at sig-nificantly reduced margins.

In the future, private banks will need to ensure full cross-border com-pliance and prepare for a time when pure offshore banking may be attrac-tive only for selected domiciles. This requires banks to understand and closely monitor the regulatory envi-ronments in all markets in which they participate to enable them to react quickly and appropriately to regula-tory changes in countries where they have clients. Offshore private banking will continue but will offer different value propositions. Smaller banks, as well as most subsidiaries of interna-tional banks will not be able to expand their onshore footprint and build the required level of capabilities, and these will likely become acquisition targets.

3. Develop new client service modelsThe financial turmoil of the last few years has clearly changed how clients feel about their banking relationships. Clients are looking for consistent, reli-able, and unbiased advice with a focus on what is right for them rather than what is right for their banker. The client service models of the future will have two main parts. First, clients will need to be segmented according to their true needs. Qualitative segmentations will become increasingly important in the future—they will put wealth managers in a better position to consider all cli-ent requirements, emotional as well as financial. The second change involves client coverage models. Leading private banks have started to adopt new client

coverage models in which relationship managers focus on a limited number of client segments (in some cases, just one), as opposed to heterogeneous cli-ent portfolios in which the clients have diverse needs and backgrounds and are located in a wide range of domiciles.

4. Learn to make money (again)With revenue pools likely to remain de-pressed for the immediate future, and with higher compliance costs, wealth managers need to learn—or relearn—how to earn money. Three areas will be key: First, banks must use rebates and fee discounts more sparingly. Second, they must optimise the product/ serv-ice mix for each client. Third, they must adopt a disciplined approach to cost management. Top banks have already started to use advanced client profit-ability steering tools, which show the level of the economic profit by client, to fully understand where value is either created or destroyed.

5. Build scale, build capabilitiesThere are several factors causing M&A to intensify in private banking includ-ing the push to separate distribution, production, and operations. A second factor is the need to quickly build scale in new markets, where indigenous com-panies are rapidly adding capabilities and gaining momentum. A third fac-tor driving M&A is the desire to add revenue at a time when revenue pools are depressed. A fourth factor is that regulatory pressure has left some banks without a viable business model. To-gether, these factors have led to a burst of deals in the last year which are ex-pected to continue, making the wealth management industry very attractive for players with a well-defined M&A strategy. We also expect to see more al-liances and cooperative deals in which traditional private bankers try to ex-pand the scope of their business.


MARKETS

Initial Public Offering (IPO) activ-ity in the Middle East has risen significantly in the first quarter of 2010, recording a fivefold increase

in the funds raised.Ernst & Young’s Middle East IPO

Update for the first quarter says over $420.5 million was raised from six IPOs, compared to $83.6 million in the same period last year.

According to Phil Gandier, Head of Transaction Advisory Services for Ernst & Young Middle East, the trend mirrors the performance of the global IPO markets in the first quarer. The re-gional upturn in number and size was largely based on the performance of the Saudi and Qatari markets. The regional markets also performed better than the last quarter, by raising $91.6 mil-lion in the fourth quarter of last year from 5 IPOs. “While it is too early to decree that markets have rebounded, this could potentially signal the return of normalcy to the markets, which had a very difficult 2009,” he says.

Saudi Arabia still robustFive IPOs in Saudi Arabia and one in Qatar made up the geographical com-position of the regional IPO market for the first quarter. Mazaya Qatar Real Es-tate Development

Company with an offer size of $144.2 million was the Middle East’s largest IPO, followed by Saudi Arabia’s Herfy Food Services ($110.2 million and Alsorayai Trading Industrial Group ($64.8 million). Solidarity Saudi Taka-

Five-fold increase in funds raised, compared to same quarter last year

IPO activity pick-up

While challenging markets will come and go, it’s the companies that are fully prepared that will best be able to leverage IPO opportunities when they open

ful, Amana for Cooperative Insurance and Wataniya Cooperative Insurance were the other three with offer sizes of $59.2 million, $34.1 million and $8 mil-lion respectively. Saudi Arabia also led the IPO tally in the previous quarter –three out of the 5 Middle East IPOs were in the Kingdom.

Phil says market appetite and inves-tor confidence are cautiously picking up. The largest oversubscription in the first quarter was by Herfy Food Serv-ices at 4.6 times offer size. This could be symptomatic of the caution with which new IPOs will be greeted in 2010, he points out. “We may not see the hun-dreds or even tenfold oversubscription that were witnessed during the boom years. Firms will need to invest more time and resources in preparing their institution for an IPO and ensuring they have a compelling equity story. While challenging markets will come and go, it’s the companies that are fully prepared that will best be able to leverage IPO opportunities when they open.”

Out of the total 6 IPOs this quarter, three were in the insurance/Takaful sectors. This trend was also observed in the previous quarter, when the regional markets went through a difficult phase. In Q4 2009, three out of 5 IPOs were for insurance firms. “Insurance licens-ing procedures in Saudi Arabia, which

opened up the sector to new entrants in 2005, oblige newly licensed firms to of-fer a percentage of their shares to the public within a set timeframe. This is why we see a disproportionate number of IPOs in the Kingdom’s insurance/Takaful sector,” Phil explains.

The global IPO activity in the first quarter of 2010 also showed substantial improvement over the same period last year. Results were driven by an ongoing robust Asian market and the revival of European listings. There were 267 deals globally in Q1 2010 worth $53.2 billion, compared to the 52 deals which raised $1.4 billion in Q1’09 (which had the low-est IPO activity in the past decade). Asia continued to experience significant IPO activity in the quarter, with 166 IPOs raising $35.1 billion, 66 per cent of the quarter’s total IPO fund raising. Nine of the 20 largest IPOs were from Asia (China, Japan and South Korea).

“Emerging market activity continues to be strong, but we also saw a revival of activity in Q1 2010 in key markets such as Tokyo, London, Paris and Frankfurt. Despite concerns about volatile mar-ket conditions at the beginning of this quarter, we expect that investors will continue to return to the European and North American markets as the global economy improves,” said Gregory K. Ericksen, Global Vice Chair for Strate-gic Growth Markets for Ernst & Young.


COVER STORY

54

CREDIT RATING

Standard & Poor’s Ratings Services has introduced a new credit ratings scale, known as the GCC regional ratings scale

(GCC scale), for the assignment of credit ratings on issuers domiciled in GCC countries or that issue local cur-rency debt in the GCC.

The GCC scale serves issuers, coun-terparties, intermediaries, investors, and insurers involved in GCC’s finan-cial markets by providing independent opinions of relative creditworthiness

GCC Credit Rating ScaleRobert E Richards of Standard & Poor’s explains process

for GCC-related issuers and issuances. The GCC regional rating scale is de-signed for issuers based in the GCC region and for capital markets debt, bank loans, and shariah-compliant obligations issued in GCC curren-cies by entities within and beyond the GCC, the rating agency says.

The GCC regional scale, while based on issuers and issuances in the GCC region, is designed to comple-ment the existing global rating scale and may offer finer credit risk differen-

tiation within the region, says Robert E Richards, criteria officer at Standard & Poor’s.

The GCC scale is the second re-gional ratings scale that Standard & Poor’s has offered, joining the ASEAN regional rating scale, which was intro-duced in May 2009. Robert answers questions on the rating process.Q: How will a GCC regional scale rat-ing appear and what are its charac-teristics?A: GCC scale ratings will feature the


identifying prefix gc. The GCC scale features both long- and short-term ratings. The highest long-term rating is ‘gcAAA’ and the highest short-term rating is ‘gcA-1+’. GCC scale ratings have their own respective rating defi-nitions, which can be found on Rat-ingsDirect under the Criteria tab or Standard & Poor’s website.

Q: What are the differences between a global scale rating and a GCC scale rating?A: The primary difference is one of scope. GCC scale ratings are designed to facilitate credit-risk comparisons among GCC-related issuers and is-suances. By contrast, a global scale rating is based on credit-risk compar-isons among issuers and issuances lo-cated all over the world. A GCC scale rating may allow for finer credit risk differentiation between some regional issuers and issuances.

Q: Are the criteria for assigning GCC scale ratings different from those used to arrive at global scale ratings?A: No. The criteria used to analyze business risk, financial risk, and other elements of credit risk are the same for both regional and global scale rat-ings.

Q: Can an issuer be assigned both GCC scale and global scale ratings?A: Yes. Both GCC scale and global scale ratings can be assigned to issuers and issues, although the GCC scale is designed to facilitate comparisons of GCC issuers and GCC currency-de-nominated debt issues distributed in GCC member states.

Q: Are GCC regional ratings com-parable to other Standard & Poor’s regional scale ratings?A: No. Each regional rating scale and national rating scale is particular to

the relevant regional or national mar-ket and addresses the credit risk envi-ronment there.

Q: Who might find GCC regional ratings useful?A: GCC regional ratings may be use-ful to issuers, counterparties, inter-mediaries, investors, and insurers seeking credit ratings on GCC issuers and issuances relative to other issu-ers and issuances within the region. GCC regional ratings might be used for traditional capital markets debt and bank loans, as well as for shariah-compliant obligations.

Q: Why are GCC scale ratings and the GCC scale being offered?A: The GCC and its member countries are taking steps to develop their lo-cal and regional capital markets. The proposed GCC Monetary Union and the development of a regional yield curve based on increased sovereign issuances are examples of this devel-opment. GCC regional ratings and the GCC scale may provide a helpful basis of comparison for credits affected by these and other measures, and could encourage broader regional market participation.

GCC regional ratings are designed to serve as an independent benchmark and information tool for investors. They, and the GCC scale, may provide a complementary tool for rating local or regional currency issuance along-side the global ratings used for rat-ing non-GCC currency denominated issuers and issuances. GCC regional ratings and the GCC scale are de-signed to meet the needs of investors participating in national or regional GCC capital markets by providing finer distinctions of credit quality. In-vestors may use GCC regional ratings and the GCC scale to compare and contrast the relative creditworthiness of issuers and issuances in the GCC.

Q: Does Standard & Poor’s have re-gional or national scales in other parts of the world?A: The GCC scale joins the ASEAN scale as Standard & Poor’s second re-gional scale. Standard & Poor’s has also established national rating scales in various capital markets, including those of Canada, Taiwan, Mexico, Bra-zil, Kazakhstan, Russia, South Africa, and Turkey. We also provide short-term ratings on our Nordic scale for the Swedish commercial paper market.

Q: How does Standard & Poor’s treat country risk in GCC regional ratings?A: Country risk results from the desta-bilizing effect of certain macroeco-nomic and other factors on the com-mercial activity of a country and can disrupt the full and timely payment of obligations sourced in that country. Standard & Poor’s analyzes country risk in assigning its global and regional scale ratings.

The rated debt’s currency of repay-ment is a key analytical factor. An ob-ligor’s capacity to repay its foreign cur-rency obligations may be lower than its capacity to repay obligations in its local currency because the sovereign may restrict access to foreign exchange.

Q: Will Standard & Poor’s assign an issuer a regional rating above that of its sovereign?A: As with Standard & Poor’s global scale, unless the relevant sovereign has the highest possible rating on the regional scale, it is possible for cer-tain issuers domiciled there to obtain a higher regional rating than that of the sovereign. If the sovereign has the highest possible rating on the GCC scale, that is, ‘gcAAA’ for long-term debt or ‘gcA-1+’ for short-term debt, it is not possible for a non-sovereign is-suer to have a higher GCC regional rat-ing than that sovereign.


TECHNOLOGY

Sharp has added yellow to the traditional red, green and blue palette to create a new televi-sion that is capable of produc-

ing stunning colour pictures. The company has just launched a series of television sets with the revolutionary Quattron quad pixel technology in the GCC market.

Masahiro Yokota, Sharp’s Divi-sional General Manager, LCD Digital System Division, Audio Video System Group, says the proprietary Quat-tron technology will revolutionise the TV industry because it will influence the way in which people would like to watch television. “The innovative Quattron technology promises the next level of growth for Sharp, as part of the company’s aggressive global strategy to take on the leadership posi-tion in LCD TV technology,’’ he says.

The new Quattron LE-820 series featuring Quad Pixel technology comes in 52, 46 and 40-inch sizes, and they all have Sharp’s UltraBrilliant Edge-lit LED technology as standard.

The sets are just 39mm deep, and the panel glass on the LE820 series extends to meet the edge of the TV for a more seamless look. The X-Gen LCD panel with UV2A technology has unique photo-alignment precisely controls the alignment of the liquid crystal molecules, while minimiz-ing light leakage, to reproduce amaz-ingly bright whites and extremely deep blacks. The mercury-free LED back-lighting reduces energy consumption over that of conventional fluorescent-backlit LCDs, and every set has an eco picture control.

According to Fred Yamaguchi, Managing Director, Sharp Middle East, the new technology is not just a step forward in the company’s vision,

TV becomes more Sharp with yellow

but the ushering in of a new era in TV technology because it introduces a fourth colour sub-pixel to the conven-tional LCD three-colour palette.

This new four-colour technology enables billions of colours to be dis-played, and brings to TV a range of never before seen colours – dazzling golds, tropical ocean blues, and sun-flower yellows, to name a few, he said.

“This is a fantastic distinction that will shape consumer standards for LCDs. Along with their pioneering colour reproduction; these new Quat-tron models feature an energy-efficient LED backlight and décor-enhancing style. The technology also uses smaller dots to make up images, enabling ul-tra-high resolution”.

Sharp feels that the new range of LED TVs will help the company boost its share in the Middle East & Africa market and help it realize the objec-tive of taking market leadership in the LED TV segment. The LCD market in

the region is expected to grow to over 3.5 million units, of which Sharp plans to achieve at least 10 per cent market share, according to Manu Mahdi, Gen-eral Manager, Sharp UAE.

With the launch of this AQUOS range equipped with Quattron tech-nology and other innovative TV prod-ucts, Sharp officials are forecasting a 30 per cent growth in sales this year for this region.

Masahiro Yokota, Divisional General Manager, LCD Digital Systems Division, Audio Visuals Systems Group Sharp Corporation, at the Dubai launch


Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank

Head Office: Abu Dhabi, Al Salam Street, P.O. Box 939 Tel: 02 6962222 Fax: 02 6450384Website : www.adcb.comBranch Name Phone Number Fax Number Tourist 02-6940000 02-6109712 AD MALL KIOSK 02-6443825 NAGASCO 02-6771925 02-6109797Al Salam 02-6962222 02-6109772Al Muroor 02-4447960 02-4444795Corniche 02 6275500 02 6260540Hamdan 02 4067555 02 6320396Khalidiya 02 5016222 02 6109822Sh. Rashed 02 4458288 02 6109815Al Falah 02 6213901 02 6109720Baniyas Town 02-5821550 02-5821007Al Raha Mall 02-5016222 02-6109807Shahama 02-5632255 02-5630035Khalifa City A 02-4014500 02-6109860Mussafah 02-5544272 02-5544273ICAD 02-5500724 02-5500739Area Office-MB 03-7558888 02-6109775Main Branch 03-7550000 02-6109775Khalifa St. Branch 03-7669999 02-6109739Ind Area Branch 03-7210009 02-6109819Al Wagan Br. 03-7351444 03-7351799Al Yahar 03-7814000 03-7826600Al Bawadi Mall 03-7028982 02-9109856Al Ruwais 02-8775015 02-8774704Al Baya 02-8721300 02-8728124Gayathi 02-8742155 02-8741626Zayed Town 02-8846180 02-8847663Mall of the Emirates 04-3411001 02-6109732Arabian centre 04-7058806 02-6109849Dubai Mall 04-7058820 02-6109850Al Qusais 04-7058888 02-6109813Jumeirah 04-4069601 02-6109749Ittihad 04-3615151 02-6109735Al Karama 04-3345000 04-3348000Al Mina Road 04-3984444 04-3982664Al Riggah 04-2958888 04-2956632Deira 04-6024100 02-6109790Sharjah Main 06-5737000 06-5722322Sharjah Ind.Area 06-5433300 06-5421285

Buhaira 06-5566169 02-6109731Fujairah 09-2223900 09-2224900Ras Al Khaimah 07-2332200 07-2332020Dibba 09-2446444 09-2444838Ajman 06-7443444 06-7443300

ADCB Senior ManagementH.E. Eissa Al Suwaidi ChairmanAla’a Eraiqat CEOArup Mukhopadhyay Head - Consumer Banking GroupDeepak Khullar Chief Financial OfficerColin Fraser Head - Wholesale Banking GroupKevin Taylor Group TreasurerKishore Rao Chief - Risk ManagementAbdulla Khalifa Al Suwaidi Head - Government RelationsSultan Mohamed Al Mahmood Head - Human ResourcesMufaddal Khumri Head - Islamic BankingAbdul Shakeel Head - Consumer Risk ManagementMartin Scott Chief Marketing OfficerMajdi Abdul Muhdi Head - Corporate CommunicationsAhmed Barakat Head - Wealth Management & Liabilities GroupThierry Bardury Head - IT & OperationsSimon Copleston General CounselHoward Gaunt Head - Business Banking GroupMike Cunningham Head - Strategic ProgrammesNabil Juma Head - Strategic Investor RelationsZaki Hamadani Head- Legal and Special AssetsAbdirizak Ali Head- Internal AuditWalter Pompliano

Abu Dhabi Islamic Bank

Head Office: Abu Dhabi Najda Street, P.O. Box 313, Abu Dhabi UAE Tel 02 6343000Email: [email protected] Fax 02 6342222Website : www.e-adib.com

Established on 20th May 1997 as a Public Joint Stock Company through the Amiri Decree No. 9 of 1997. The bank commenced commercial operations on 11th November 1998, and was formally inaugurated by His Highness Sheikh Abdulla Bin Zayed Ak Nahyan, UAE Minister of Information and Culture on 18th April 1999. All contracts, operations and transactions are carried out in accordance with Islamic Shari’a principles. Branches

Abu Dhabi Main 02 6168118


Aref Ismail Al Khouri Manager Mushref 02 4455177Ezzeldin Nagdy Manager Madinat Zayed 02 6100821 Mohamed Yousef ManagerKhalidiya Ladies Abu Baker Omar Manager Sheikha Al Suwaidi Manager Khalifa Street 02 6100590Omar Aqel Manager

Al AinSinaiya 03 7211777Omar M. Basheer ManagerClock Tower Branch 03 7076444Ali Abdullah Al Manager Dhaheri Al Jimi Mall Branch 03 7633500Ahmed Abdullah Manager Al Boloshi

DubaiAl Twar 04 2611116Ibrahim Alqasser ManagerOpposite Deira City Center 04 3973333Hashim Al Zarooni Manager Shk. Zayed Rd. Mohamed Hussein Zainal Manager 04 4033400

FujairahFujairah 09 2222711Fahad Al Shaer Manager Dibba 02 6100920Ali Mohammed Manager Ras Al Khaimah 07 2284448Saif Hamdan Alkeem ManagerSharjah 06 5075100Ali Essa Alshaqoosh Manager

Al Ahli Bank of Kuwait - Dubai

Head Office: KuwaitRegional Head Office: Dubai Tel 04 2681118Opposite Hamarain Centre, Deira Fax 04 2684445P.O.Box 1719, Dubai, E-mail: [email protected]: www.ahlibank.ae Management & Senior Personnel:Vikram Pradhan General Manager, UAE Vijay Shah Head of Trade Finance & Operations Hiranand Motwani Manager Treasury Krishna Kumar Manager Retail Operations

American Express Bank Ltd

Representative Office, Suite 509 Tel: 04 3975000; Fax: 04 3976986The Business Centre, Khalid Bin Al Waleed Street, Bur DubaiP.O. Box 3304, Dubai.Prabir A. Biswas Director & Chief RepresentativeSumit.K.Roy Director-financial institution groupJohn A. Smetanka Head-wealth management-subcontinent and global NRI

Arab African International Bank

Head Office: Cairo, Egypt.Regional Head Office Dubai Tel: 04 3937773ART Tower, Al Mina Street, Opp. Ports & Customs Bldg., Bur Dubai

P.O. Box 1049, Dubai Fax: 04 3937774Swift ARAIAEAD, E-mail: [email protected]: www.aaib.comHistory: Established 1964 as the first Arab joint venture bankHemant Jethwani General Manager UAE Dubai Branch: Key ExecutiveAlaa Sobhy Head of syndication and assert tradeAbu Dhabi Tel: 02 6323400; Fax: 02-6216009Arab Monetary Fund Bldg, Corniche Street, P.O. Box 928, Abu DhabiKey ExecutiveHani Hassan Branch Manager

Arab Bank

Head Office Jordan – Amman Tel: 04 2950845; Fax: 04 2024369P.O.Box 950544, 950545Amman 11195 Website: www.arabbank.aeHistory: The Arab Bank Group is one of the principal financial institutions in the Arab world and ranks among the leading international banks in terms of equity, earnings and assets. Established in 1930 in Jerusalem. The Arab Bank Group is owned by about 4,000 shareholders from all over the world, mainly Arab countires. The Group has a diversified network of over 350 branches worldwide. Abdul Majeed Shoman ChairmanAbdel Hamid Shoman Deputy Chairman & Chief Executive OfficerU.A.E Area Management Mohammad A . Azab Senior Vice President - DubaiSaed Jarallah Senior Vice President – Abu DhabiAladin Al-Khatib Treasury HeadHatem Kurdieh Corporate Banking HeadTareq HajHasan Retail Banking HeadMohammad Mattar Central Operations Unit ManagerHani Hirzallah Regional Manager Human Resources /Gulf RegionTareq Ibrahim Head of Human ResourcesAmmar Al Khayyat Financial ControllarGhassan Nimer IT Center Regional ManagerJihad Ghoury Legal CounselSanjay Malhotra Global Head of Marketing & Product DeveleopmentNasser Maghtheh Senior AuditorAnan Al Khatib Premises & Pruchasing Officer (Engineer)Suleiman Malhas U.A.E Branches Audit Centre Manager

Dubai Al Ittihad Street 04 2950845

Mohammed Azab Branch Manager

Deira 04 2221231Mohammed Elayyan Branch Manager

Abu Dhabi Al Naser Street 02 6392225 Nasser Serries Branch Manager

Al Ain 03 7641328Colock Tower roundabout, Al Ain StreetMaen Jarrar Branch Manager Sharjah Al Arooba Street 06 5618999Maher Al Debis Branch Manager

Ajman 06 7422431Rashid Bin Humaid Street Modhar Kherfan Branch Manager

Ras Al Khaimah 07 2288437Oman Street, Al Nakheel Ali Zatar Branch Manager

Fujairah Sheik Zayed Street 09 2222050


Abdel Hamid Qamhieyah Branch Manager Call Centre Within UAE 800 40 43Outside UAE 009714 2953889

Arab Bank for Investment and Foreign Trade

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6721900Regional Head Office, Sh. Hamdan Street, Tourist Club Area Fax 02 6785271P.O. Box 46733, Abu Dhabi Telex 22455 ARBIFT EMEmail: [email protected]: www.arbift.comHistory: Established in 1976 in Abu Dhabi Registered as a Puvlic Joint Stock CompanyManagement & PersonnelIbrahim N. R. Lootah General Manager 02 6952286Hassan S. Kishko Head of Finance 02 6721299M.A. Majid Siddiqui Head of HR & Admin 02 6728785Khalid Mohammed Bin Amir Head of Operations 02 6776109Najib Taleb Nasser Head of Commercial Banking Ahmed Majid Lootah Head of Retail Banking 02 6743801M. Santosh Babu Senior Manager IT 02 6722975Izzeldin Al Siddiq Salem Mgr - Inspection & Internal Audit 02 6780592Osman Hamid Suliman Mgr - Banking Relations Dept 02 6787380Mir Asif Ali Mgr - Treasury Dept 02 6721600Saidi Zoubir Head of Business Dev. Dept. 02 6723763Tareq S’adi Al Darras Mgr - Credit Risk Management 02 6720886Issam Abugisseisa Legal Advisor 02-6791642Abu Dhabi Main, Sh. Hamdan Street 02 6721900Noora Ebrahim Manager -Sales & Services 02 6780423Souk Branch 02 6269500Al Masaood Building - Khalifa Street, Abu DhabiNasser Rashed Al Ali Manager 02 6275087

Al Ain 03 7655133Mohd. Sultan Al-Darmaki Bldg., 1st Floor, Old Passport Office Road.Hussain Marzouqul Manager 03 7656482

Dubai 04 2220151Arbift Tower, Baniyas Street, DeiraAdel Mohd. Khalfan Manager 04 2282071Al Bagh

Sharjah King Faisal Street 06 5744888Fatima Al Muani Manager 06 5747766

Arab Banking Corporation

Abu Dhabi Office 02 6447666Office, 10th Floor, Abu Dhabi Trade Centre, Abu Dhabi MallP.O.Box 6689, Abu Dhabi Fax 02 6444429Mohamed El Calamawy Chief Representative

Arab Emirates Investment Bank PJSC

Head Office: Cairo Egypt Tel: 04 3937773Regional Office: Dubai Fax: 04 3937774ART Tower, Al Mina Road, Opposite Maritime City, Bur DubaiP.O Box 1049 DubaiSWIFT: ARAIAEADE-mail: [email protected]: www.aaib.com

Management-UAEHemant Jethwani General ManagerAlaa Sobhy Head of Syndication and Asset TradeMahendran Raman Head of Operations and Liabilities

Abu Dhabi Branch Tel: 02 6323400 Fax: 02 6216009Arab Monetary Fund Bldg., CornicheP.O Box 928, Abu Dhabi

BLOM Bank France SA

Dubai Tel 04 2284655Al Maktoum Street, Deira Dubai, P.O. Box 4370 Fax 04 2236260email: [email protected]: www.blombank.aeBassem Ariss Regional Manager 04 2222355Samir Hobeika Branch Manager 04 2214648Michel Germanof Manager Corporate Credit UAE 04 2242067 Mohammad M Ansari Treasurer 04 2224812

Sharjah

PO Box 5803, Al Buheira Tower, Al Buheira Corniche Tel 06 5736100 Fax 06 5736080 Mokhtar Kassem Branch Manager

Bank Muscat

Dubai Representative Office Dubai Creek Tower, Baniyas Road, Deira Tel 04 2222267P.O. Box 29969, Dubai Fax 04 2210115Lawrence P. Monteiro Chief Representative

BBK BSC

Dubai-Representative Office 04 2210560Dubai Creek Tower Office 18A, Baniyas Road, DeiraPO Box 31115 Tel 04 2210560 / 70 Fax 04 2210260 Website www.bbkonline.comHistory: Established on 16th March, 1971

Murad Ali Murad ChairmanKarim Bucheery CEO & GMSh. Rashed Al Khalifa Deputy General Manager

Dubai ReP-Office: CK Jaidev Head of Representative Office Rajiv Kapoor Relationship Manager & Loan Syndications Wafa Al-Alwan Relationship Manager & Loan Syndications

Bank of Baroda

Dubai Zonal Office: Sheikh Rashid Bldg.Ali Bin Abu Talib Street, Bur Dubai,P.O.Box 3162, Dubai Tel: 04 3531628E-mail: [email protected] Fax: 04 3530839UAE Website: www.bankofbarodauae.aeHistory: Established in 1908, July 20Nationalized on July 19, 1969

Zonal Office, DubaiAshok K. Gupta Chief Executive, (GCC Operations) 04 3136699Narayanan Devarao Dy. Chief Executive 04 3136617Umarmiya S .Sayied Chief Manager (Credit) 04 3136690


Paramjeet S. Bhatia Chief Manager (Syndication) 04 3136647Sujeet V. Bhale Chief Manager (Syndication) 04 3136692P.K. Rout Senior Manager (HR & Admn.) 04 3136694

Retail Banking DubaiH. S. Sagar Chief Manager (Retail / Marketing) 04 3136658Renuka Shyam Senior Manager (Retail/Marketing) 04 3136603Mehul Kumar Dave Senior Manager (Marketing) 0566195733Shaibal Banerjee Manager (Marketing) 0566093201Niermala Behera Manager (Marketing) 0558638983 K. Prabha Manager (Marketing) 0566253180

I.T. Dept.Anil Kumar Agrawal Senior Manager (I.T.) 04 3136661Hardeep Singh Senior Manager (I.T.) 04 3136663

TreasuryDilip Kumar Mansingh Senior Manager (Dealer) 04 3136630Shankar Kumar Jha Manager (Dealer) 04 3136631Vikrant Gupta Manager (Dealer) 04 3136636

Dubai:Sheikh Rashid Bldg, Ali Bin Abu Talib Street, DubaiBur Dubai 04 3136666N Sundareswaran Asst.General Manager 04 3136616M.V.Murali Krishna Chief Manager (Operations) 04 3136670Sarat C.Baral Chief Manager (Credit) 04 3136610Sunil Tutoo Senior Manager (India desk) 04 3136680Lalitha Janakiraman Senior Manager (Trade Fin.) 04 3136620

Abu DhabiAl Halami Center, Sheikh Hamdan Street, Abu Dhabi 02 6330244/6322000N.K. Batra Asst. General Manager 02 6344302H.T. Solanki Senior Manager (Credit) 02 6326364Barun Meher Senior Manager (Operations) 02 6326364Sunil Kumar Manager (Marketing) 0566092501

SharjahAl Mina Road, Al Maraijah , Near Sharjah Cinema, Sharjah 06 5684231/5686232B.B. Pradhan Chief Manager 06 5683273S.K. Tiwari Senior Manager (Operations) 06 5687086 Satya Narayan Patra Senior Manager 06 5684231Sanjeev Singh Manager (Marketing) 0566093847Shiv Kumar Shukla Manager (Marketing) 0566241586

Al Ain:Clock Tower, Roundabout, Planning Street, Al Ain 03 7519880Ashwini K Patria Senior Branch Manager 03 7659554Akhilesh Vashistha Senior Manager (Operations) 0508591171

Deira:Kuwaiti Bldg., Al Rigga, Baniyas Street, Deira 04 2287949Ramesh M. Shetty Asst General Manager 04 2286516 Pamela Azaredo Chief Manager (Operations) 04 2286216Satish Agarwal Chief Manager (Credit) 04 2292181R K Madaan Manager (Marketing) 0559692170S.S. Reddy Senior Manager (Marketing) 0501934096Vipin Bhatt Manager (Marketing) 0566092869 Ras Al KhaimahAl Qasimi Bldg, Oman Street, Al Nakheel 07 2229293Surendra S. Parihar Senior Branch Manager 07 2229293J.K.Jais Senior Manager (Operations) 07 2229293K.S.Iyer Senior Manager (Credit) 07 2229293

Bank of New YorkRepresentative office Tel 02 6263008Suite 402, The Blue Tower, Sh. Khalifa Bin Zayed Street Fax 02 6263308P.O.Box 727, Abu DhabiHani Kablawi Managing Director

Bank of Sharjah

Sharjah Head Office – Al Hosn Avenue Tel 06 5694411 P.O. Box 1394, Sharjah Fax 06 5694422E-mail: [email protected]: Established on 22nd December 1973 with Banque Paribas, Paris

Ahmed Abdulla Al Noman ChairmanVarouj Nerguizian General ManagerMario Tohme Deputy General ManagerFadi Ghosn Deputy General ManagerAli Burheimah Commercial ManagerMohammed Asghar Senior Operations ManagerFares Saade Senior ManagerMichel Germanos Risk ManagerJayakumar Menon Finance ManagerBerj Tossounian Credit Manager - SharjahWahide Assaad IT ManagerJihad Aoun Investment ManagerSamer Hamed Audit & Control Manager Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6795555Al Mina Street, P.O.Box 27391 Fax 02 6795843Ramzi Saba Senior ManagerMazen El Attar Operations Manager- Abu DhabAnni Barsoum Credit Manager - Abu DhabiDubai Tel 04 2827278Al Gharoud Street, PO Box 27141 Fax 04 2827270Nadim Melki Senior ManagerToufic Youakim Credit Manager - DubaiFadi Haddad Operations Manager - DubaiAl Ain 03 7517171Khalifa Street, PO Box 84287 Fax 03 75170770George Dib Branch ManagerRida Higazi Deputy Branch Manager

Bank Saderat Iran

Dubai Tel 04-6035555Regional Office, Al Maktoum Street, P.O. Box 4182 Fax 04 2229951

Dr.Hamid Borhani Regional ManagerAbdul Reza Shabahangi Assistant Regional ManagerMohammad Yousefi Peyhani Assistant Regional ManagerMajid Tavasoli H.R. & Organization Dept. ManagerGholamreza Joulaie Credit Facility Dept. ManagerRahim Erfan Moghaddam Account Dept. ManagerMehran Arzhang Letter of Credit Dept. Manager Majid Mirnasiri Recovery Dept. ManagerHamdi Reza Khalajzadeh Dealing Dept. ManagerHojatollah Malek Mohammadi IT Dept. ManagerMansoor Sedaghat Motlagh Service Dept. Manager Mohsen Hossein Hosseinpour Manager of Al Maktoum BranchGholamreza Ebadi Fard Manager of Murshid Bazar Branch Saeed Mirzaian Tafti Manager of Sheikh Zayed Rd. Branch Ferdos Zolfagharian Manager of Bur Dubai Branch Seifollah Farzan Mehr Manager of Sharjah Branch


Jalil Vosooghi Manager of Ajman Branch Ali Abasteh Manager of Abu Dhabi Branch Peyman Sabri Manager of Al Ain Branch

Banque Du Caire

Abu Dhabi Regional Head Office (02) 6225880P.O. Box 533, Abu Dhabi Telefax 02-6225881History: Established on 8th May, 1952 On July 1, 1960 the Amman Branch became independent under the title of Cairo Amman Bank. In July, 1961 the Bank was na-tionalized. On November 2, 1962 the Lebanese branches were absorbed by Banque Misr-Liban S.A.L On October 1, 1979 fo3rmer branches in Saudi Arabia have been saudized and a new bank was formed under the name of Saudi Cairo Bank.

Mohamed kamal Al Deen Barakat Chairman Ahmad Sherif Rehab Regional Manager Abu Dhabi - UAE PO Box 533 Tel: 02-6272525Abu Dhabi Branch Mohamad Kamal Farid (Acting Manager) Tel: 02-6273000Dubai Branch Labib Abdul Ghaffar Tel: 04-2715175Sharjah Branch Tareq Hafez Tel: 06-5739379Ras Al Khaima Mohamad Abdul Ghani (Acting Manager) Tel: 07-2332245Al Ain Abdul Hamid Saeed Tel: 03-7511104

Barclays Bank PLC

Dubai Tel: 04 3626888Emaar Business Park, Building No. 4, Sheikh Zayed Road Fax: 04 3663133P.O. Box: 1891, DubaiWebsite www.barclays.com

Saleem Sheikh Regional Managing Director, Middle East & North AfricaMark Petchell Group Country Managing DirectorAmin Habib Director - Corporate BankingFaizen Mitha Regional TreasurerFarrukh Zain Head of Trade SalesFlorence Goodman Head of Corporate Afffairs & Public RelationsDavid Inglesfield Location Manager - International & Premier Bank-ing Callum Watts-Reham Director, Market Manager, Gulf - Barclays Private ClientsBarclays CapitalDubai International Financial Centre, Level 9, West Wing, The Gate Building, Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai Nicholas Hegarthy Managing Director, Head of Middle East & North Africa

BLC Bank (France) S.A.

Head Office17-19 Avenue Montaigne Tel 33 1 56 52 11 0075008 Paris, France Fax 33 1 56 52 11 11Mr. Andre Tyan General Manager

Regional Office Dubai Al Maidan Tower, Al Maktoum St. Tel 04 2222291P.O. Box 4207, Dubai Fax 04 2283935E-mail: [email protected] Melhem Dagher Administration & Operations Manager

DubaiAl Maidan Tower, Al Maktoum St. Tel 04 2222291P.O. Box 4207, Dubai Fax 04 2279861 Hamze Abdul Sater Branch Manager

Abu DhabiMohd. Joan Al Badi Bldg., Hamdan St. Tel 02 6220055P.O. Box 3771 Fax 02 6222055Ghassan Haddad Acting Regional ManagerSamir Rached Acting Branch Manager

Sharjah Al Salam Bldg., Al Mina St. Tel 06 5724561P.O. Box 854 Fax 06 5727843Victor Khoriaty Branch Manager

Ras-Al-KhaimahSheikh Ahmad Bin Saker Al Quasimi Bldg., Al Montaser St. Tel 07 2286222P.O. Box 771 Fax 07 2275067Abd El Hajj Branch Manager

BNP Paribas

Abd Ahmad Al Hajj Branch ManagerAbu Dhabi Tel 02 6130400Khalifa Street, P.O. Box, 2742, Abu Dhabi Fax 02 6268638Marc Checri General Manager

Central Bank of the U.A.E

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6652220/6915555Head Office, Al Bateen Area, Bainoona Street Fax 02 6668483/6668621P.O.Box: 854, Abu Dhabi, www.cbuae.gov.aeE-mail: [email protected]: CBAU AE AAReuters dealing code: CBEMHistory Established in 1980 as a central bank of the United Arab Emirates by a federal decree. Central bank took over the activity of the United Arab Emirates currency board which was established in 1973.Management & PersonnelH.E. Sultan Bin Nasser Al-Suwaidi Governor H.E. Mohd. Ali Bin Zayed Al Falasi Deputy Governor

Board of DirectorsH.E. Mohd. Eid M. Jasim Al-Meraikhi ChairmanH.E. Jumaa Al-Majid Vice ChairmanH.E. Sultan Bin Nasser Al-Suwaidi Governor

MembersAli Al-Sayed Abdulla, Jamal Nasser Lootah, Khalifa Nasser Bin Huwaileel, Saeed Rashid Al Yateem Al Muhairy

Executive DirectorsSaeed Abdulla Al Hamiz Executive Director-Banking Supervision & Exami-nation Dept.Rashid Mohamed Al Fandi Executive Director - Banking Operations Dept.Saif Hadef Al Shamesi Executive Director - Treasury DepartmentSalem Ahmed Al-Hammadi Executive Director - Research & Statistics DepartmentAbdulla Hamad Al-Zaabi Executive Director - Internal Audit DepartmentJamal Ebrahim Al Mutawaa Executive Director - Administration Department

Economic AdvisorsAbed Alla Osama Malki, Mohammed Zeitouni Bechri

Portfolio ManagersMohammed Abdulla Mohammed, Brian Gardner

Anti-Money Laundering & Suspicious Cases UnitAbdul Rahim Mohamed Al Awadi Asst. Executive Director

General Secretariat & Legal Affairs Division


Salem Said Al Kubaisi Senior Manager

Financial Control DepartmentHassan Ibrahim Al Hamar Senior Manager

Personnel DivisionAli Ghurair Al Romaithi Senior Manager

Correspondent Banking DivisionSultan Rashed Al-Sakeb Senior Manager

Public Relations DivisionAbdul Raheem Abdullah Manager

Information Technology Division/ UAE Switch DivisionKhalifa Al Dhaheri Senior Manager

Dubai Tel: 04 3939777P.O. Box 448 Fax: 04 3937802Omar Al Qaizi Manager-in-Charge

Sharjah Tel: 06 5592592Old Airport Road, Opp. Immigration Bldg., P.O. Box 645, Sharjah Fax: 06 5593977Zakaria Abdul Aziz Al Suwaidi Senior Manager

Ras Al Khaimah Tel: 07 2284444Al Nakheel, Oman Street, P.O. Box 5000 Fax: 07 2284646Salem Jasem Al Baker Asst. Executive Director

Fujairah Tel: 09 2224040P.O. Box 768, Fujairah Fax: 09 2226805Ali Mubarak Saeed Abbad Senior Manager

Al Ain Tel: 03 656656Ali Ibn Abee Taleb Street, Oud Al Touba Fax: 03 664777P.O. Box 1414Ajlan Ahmed Al Qubaisi Asst. Executive Director

Citibank N.A (UAE Branches)

Date of Establishment 1964Nationality USALegal Status Commercial Banking Services (F)Regional Head Office Oud Metha TowersP.O Box 749, Dubai – UAETel: 04- 3245000Telex: 023 6738736Cable: CITIBAEMSwift: CITIAEADReuters: N/AEmail: [email protected]: www.citibank.aeAuditors: KPMGDomestic Branches: Al Wasl Road Branch (Main Branch) Tel: 04 3245000Oud Metha Road, P.O Box 749 Dubai Branch (Next to Burjuman) Tel: Abu Dhabi Branch Tel: 02 6982206Al Salam Street, Next to Lulu Center Fax: 02 6726381P.O Box 999, Abu DhabiSharjah Branch Tel: 06 5072101Beside Sharjah Emigration, Fax: 06 5723378Opposite Civil Court. Sharjah Al Ain Branch Tel: 03 7641090Sh. Zayed Street Fax: 03 7663887Broad of Directors: N/A

General Management: Atiq Ur-Rehman, MD for the Middle East and Chief Executive Officer, UAE Sanjoy Sen, Consumer Bank Head – Middle EastMohammed Azab, Chief Officer, UAE Offices, Citi Private Bank

Clearstream Banking

Dubai Tel 04 3310644City Tower 2, Sheikh Zayed Road Fax 04 3316973Website: www.clearstream.comRobert Tabet Vice President Middle East & North Africa

Commercial Bank International

Dubai Tel 04 2275265Head OfficeDubai Al Riqqa Street Deira , P.O Box 4449 Tel : 04 2275265 Website : www.cbiuae.com Fax : 04 2279038 Hamad Al Mutawaa Chairman H.E. Humaid Al Qatami Deputy Chairman Abdulla Rashid Omran Managing Director and Board Member 04 2242104

Mohammed Saadeh Head of GBG 04 2126500 Abdulla Amer Jasem Head of HR & Admin 04 2126466 Hesham Abdulla Head of Branches & Services 04 6020615 Ahmed Mustafa Tahoun Head of Internal Audit & compliance Division 04 2126603 Ramanthan Murgappan Senior Manpower planning & Recruitment Manager 04 2126444 Zainab Nour Aldin Employee Relations Manager 04 2126 442 Yousef Haddad Planning & Development Manager 04 2126190 Bashir Haji Mohd Chief Dealer 04 2126214 A.D.Abooty Head Of Operations & Finance 04 2126291 K.E Mammoo Accounts Manager 04 2126215 Faris Saddi Chief information Officer 04 2060700 Yousef Al Marshoudi Dubai Branch Manager 04-2275265 Tariq Selaij Bur Dubai Manager 04-3559577 Ameena Bin Kaali Sheikh Zayed Branch Manager 04 3405555 Ahmed Al Junaibi Abu Dhabi Branch Manager 02-6913111 Abdulla Ali Almadhani Al Ain Branch Manager 03 7669994 Mohammed Ishaq RAK Branch Manager (AL Manar Mall) 07 2274777 Ahmed Darwish RAK Branch Manager (Nakhel Branch) 07 2227555 Alyia Al Mulla Sharjah Branch Manager 06 512100 Ahmed Bin Masood Fujairah Branch Manager 09 2011777

Dubai Main Branch (Al Riqqa Street)Yousef Al Marshaudi Branch manager 04 2126101Bur DubaiTariq Sulaij Branch manager 04 3555511Sheikh Zayed RoadAmeena Mhd. Bin Kaadi Branch manager 04 3405555Abu Dhabi Ahmed Sulaim Al Junaibi Branch Manager 02 6264400AL AINAbdulla Ali Branch manager 03 7669994Ras Al KhaimahKhaled Al Mannai Branch Manager (Manar Mall) 07 2274777Ahmed Yousef A. Darwish Branch Manager (Nakeel Branch) 07 2227555SharjahAliya Al Mulla Branch manager 06 5687666

Commercial Bank of Dubai

COMMERCIAL BANK OF DUBAI,P.O. BOX 2668, AL AITIHAD STREET, DUBAI


TOLL-FREE: 800 CBD (223)TEL: 04 2121000 FAX: 04 2121911E-Mail: [email protected] Website: www.cbd.ae

MANAGEMENT COMMITTEEPeter Baltussen Chief ExecutiveYaqoob Yousuf Hassan Deputy Chief ExecutiveIbrahim Abdulla General Manager, Administration & FinanceMahmoud Hadi General Manager, Systems & OperationsFaisal Galadari General Manager, Business GroupAhmed Shaheen General Manager, Credit & Risk Management

HEADS OF DEPARTMENTSStephen Davies Head of Corporate BankingMoukarram Attasi Head of Asset ManagementFrans Jan Burkens Head of Consumer BankingJohn Tuke Head of Treasury & ALMV.P Bhatia Head of Treasury TradingMasood Azhar Head of Strategic Planning DepartmentAmir Afzal Head of Information TechnologyAdel Al Sammak Head of Commercial Banking Kanan Iyer Head of Internal AuditAlan Hill Head of Treasury SalesAbdul Rahim Al Nimr Head of Wealth ManagementBadr Soueidan Head of MarketingNabil Tayyeb Head of Islamic BankingMr. Mohamed Mardood Head of Central Operations DepartmentMr. Hassan Al Redha Head of Financial InstitutionsAkram Gharabeh Head of Financial ControlWaleed Bin Suloom Head of Personal Banking and Alt Banking Chan-nelsJamal Saleh Head of Risk ManagementSalah Omer Head of Legal ServicesRahmatulla Khan Head of Consumer ProductsNigel Foster Head of Human Resources StrategyWafaii Tamimi Head of RecoveryREGIONAL MANAGERS Mr. Abdul Aziz Al Ansari AGM, Sharjah BranchIbrahim Salama Regional Manager, Main RegionOthman Bin Hendi Regional Manager, Abu Dhabi & New Dubai RegionAlsayed Mohd. Al Hashimi Regional Manager, Deira Region Marwan Ibrahim Regional Manager, Northern Emirates RegionAhmed Al Aboodi Regional Manager, Bur Dubai Region

Coutts & Co.

Representative Office - Dubai Tel 04 2217007Twin Towers, Baniyas Street, Deira Fax 04 2217006P.O. Box 42220Sarah Deaves CEOSandra Shaw General Manager Martin Bond Private Banker

Calyon Corporate & Investment Bank (Previously Crédit Agricole Indosuez & Crédit Lyonnais) DubaiWorld Trade Centre, Level 32 Tel: 04 3314211P.O.Box: 9256 Fax: 04 3313201

Website: www.calyon.comAmr Alkabbani Regional Manager – Gulf 04 3317316Ludovic Bernard-Maissa Regional COO Eric Fromaget Head of Private Banking 04 3321300Sebastian Van der List Head of Corporate Banking – UAE 04 3315836Naeem Khan Trade Finance 04 3291055Albert Mondjian Head of Investment Banking – MEA 04 4284803 Abu DhabiAl Muhairy Centre, Level 5 Tel: 02 6351100Block C, Sheikh Zayed the First Street Fax: 02 6344995P.O.Box: 4725Ghazi Abdul Fattah Branch Manager 02 6351991

Credit Suisse

Abu Dhabi Dhabi Tower, 4th floor, Sheikh Hamdan Street Tel 02 6275048P.O.Box 47060 Fax 02 6274109Jean-Marc Suter Director

Dubai P.O. Box 33660 04 3620000The Gate bldg, 9th Floor Fax 04 3620001Dubai International Finance Centre ( DIFC), Dubai Head of Regional Office Beat Naegell

Deutsche Bank A G

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6333122P.O.Box 52333 Fax 02 6322044E-mail: [email protected] Moeller Representative

Dubai P.O. Box: 50490Emirates Towers, Level 27b Fax 04 3199560Karl French Director Tel : 04 3199514 Private Wealth Management - AsiaNadeem Masud Director Tel : 04 3199524 Global MarketsHarris Irfan Vice President Tel : 04 3199520 Global Equities & DerivativesRohit Johri Vice President Tel : 04 3199522 Private Wealth Management - Asia

Dresdner Bank AG

Dubai Representative OfficeBurjuman Business Towers, 10th Floor, Office 1011 Bur Dubai, P.O. Box: 25654 Tel 04 3596444 Fax 04 3596116E-mail: [email protected]

Bashar A. Barakat Chief Representative Regional Head GCC & Yemen

Dubai Bank

Main Office Sheikh Zayed Road, Near Dubai World Trade Centre Tel 04 3328989P.O. Box 65555, Dubai Fax 04 3290071E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.dubaibank.ae

History: Established in September 2002


Ziad Makkawi Chief Executive Officer

Dubai Islamic Bank

Head OfficeAl Maktoum Street, Dubai Tel 04 2953000 P.O. Box 1080, Dubai Fax 04 2954111Website: www.dib.ae. Email : [email protected]: Established March 12, 1975H.E. Mohammed Ebrahim Al Shaibani Chairman H.H. Khaled bin Zayed S. Al Nehayan Deputy ChairmanAbdulla Al Hamli CEO

BranchesDubaiDeira Main Branch 04 2959999Bur Dubai 04 3971717Al Souk 04 2233300Ras Al Khor 04 3330060Al Twar 04 2631000Jumeirah Beach Residence 04 4270400Oud Metha 04 3366313Nad Al Hamar 04 2899551Jumeirah 04 3429955Abu Hail 04 2681818Abu Dhabi 02 6346600Airport Road, Abu Dhabi 02 6346600Al Salam 02 6450555Corniche 02 6819300Al Muroor 02 4490007Al Khalidiya 02 6677119Sharjah Sharjah Main 06 5726444Wasit 06 5584455Al Tawun 06 5775500Moweleh 06 5350222Al Nuaimiyah 06 7410333 Al Ain Al An Main 03 7644111Al Ain Mall 03 7516555Ajman 06 7466555Ras Al Khaimah 07 2284888Khuzam, Ras Al Khaimah 07 2362666Fujairah 09 2221550Umm Al Quwain 06 7666630

El Nilein Bank

Abu Dhabi P.O.Box 46013 Tel 02 6269995 Fax 02 6275551Abdulla Mahmoud Awad Manager Tel 02 6720934Mohamed Osman Salih Deputy Manager 02 6761916Murlidhar G. Ramchandani Chief Accountant & Dealer 02-6729300Ahmed Hillali Ahmed Head Investment Dept. & Credit 02-6729300

Emirates Bank International

DubaiMain Branch, Baniyas Road, Deira Tel 04 2256900P.O. Box 2923, Dubai Fax 04 2267718

Branches

Abu Dhabi 02 6455151Hameed Sheikh ManagerAl Ain 03 7510055/77Ghanim Al Hajeri Manager Al Maktoum Ali Malallah ManagerAl Quoz Mohd. Abdulla Manager Baniyas Square Sherif Al Ulama ManagerBander Talib Fareed Aquilli ManagerDubai Main Branch Amal Al Qamzi ManagerFujairah 09 2222114/110 Yousif Al Marshoudi ManagerInternet City 04 3910840/1 Balakrishnan Nair ManagerGalleria Farida Al Balooshi Manager IBN Gardens 04 8844689Hamdan Mohd. Abdulla Manager Jebel Ali Free Zone 04 8815551Abdul Rahman Ibrahim Manager Karama Muna Al Falahi ManagerKarama Shopping Complex Nawal Al Khader ManagerMankhool Abdul Rahim Abdulla ManagerQiyadah Fatima Al Midfa ManagerGhusais Fatima Al Midfa ManagerRamoul Ibrahim Hassan ManagerRas Al Khaimah 07 2272333 Khalifa Bin Kalban ManagerSatwaMohamed Bilal ManagerSharjah Industrial Area 06 5345577Mohamed Al Shouq ManagerSharjah 06 5733300Mahmoud Saif Manager Souk Samia Al Aqady ManagerUmm Suqueim Nazia Kalban ManagerTower Saif Al Mansoori ManagerWorld Trade Centre Abdulla Sulaij Al Falasi ManagerNajdah 02 6771919 Butti Al Assiri Manager

Emirates Industrial Bank

Abu Dhabi - Head Office Tel 02 6339700P.O. Box 2722, Abu Dhabi Fax 02 6319191/6326397E-mail: [email protected] Tel 04 2211300Arbift Tower, Deira P.O. Box 5454, Dubai Fax 04 2232320E-mail: [email protected]: www.emiratesindustrialbank.netSenior Management Personnel/Branch ManagerMohamed Abdulbaki Mohamed


General ManagerAhmed Mohamed Bakhit Khalfan Deputy General ManagerAbdullah Rashed Omran Dubai Branch ManagerKhalifa Al Falasi Acting Projects Division ManagerAli Ahmed Al Essa Development Services Division ManagerNasser Haji Malek Administration ManagerEssa A. Bu Al Rougha Internal Audit ManagerMohamed Moneir Makled Finance ManagerSalem Abu Baker Salem Acting Loans Division Manager

Emirates Islamic Bank

P.O. Box: 6564, 2nd & 3rd Floor, Al Gurg Tower 1 Tel: 04 3160330Plot 372 - Riggat Al Buteen, Deira, Dubai. Fax: 04 2272172www.emiratesislamicbank.aeEbrahim Fayez Al Shamsi CEO 04 3160330Abdulla Showaiter (General manager – corporate and investment banking) Faisal Aqil General manager – retail banking Ahmed Fayez Alshamsi chief financial officer Syed Imran Bashir Head of marketing and product development Samih Mohd Qadri Awadalla head of branches Nasir Ahmed Khan head of consumer finance Zahir Mulla head of operations

IMB (Main Branch) P.O. Box: 6564, Al Gurg Tower 2, Riggat Al Buteen, Dubai.BUD (Bur Dubai) P.O. Box: 6564, Khalid Bin Walid Road, Dubai.DFR (Diyafa) P.O. Box: 6564, Diyafa Road, Dubai.RIQ (Riqqa) P.O. Box: 6564, Omar Bin Al Khattab Street, Dubai.ADC (Abu Dhabi) P.O. Box: 46077, Sheikh Rashid Bin Saeed Al Maktoum Street, Abu Dbahi.ROS (Ras Al-Khaima) P.O. Box: 5198, 191 Oman Street, Al Nakeel, Ras Al Khaima.Fuj (Fujairah) P.O. Box: 1472, Sheikh Hamad Bin Abdulla Street, Fujairah.AJS (Al Ain) P.O. Box: 15095, Jawazat Street, Al Ain.QFS (Umm Al-Qaiwain) P.O. Box: 315, King Faisal Road, Umm Al Qaiwain.SBA (Sharjah) P.O. Box: 5169, Al Arooba Bank Street, Sharjah.

Finance House P.J.S.C.

Mr. Mohammed Abdullah Jumaa Al Qubaisi Chairman

Mr. Abdul Hamid Umer Taylor General Manager 02 6194998Mr. T.K. Raman Chief Operating Officer 02 6194889Mr. Mohammed Wassim Khayata Executive VP – Strategic Planning 02 6194445Mr. Ramesh S. Mahalingam Chief Investments & Financial Officer 02 6194601Mrs. Shagufta Farid Khan Head of Internal Audit 02 6194223Ms. Lina Abdul Hamid I. El Araj Manager – General Services 02 6194702Mr. Tarek Soubra Vice President – Central Operations 02 6194362

Ms. Maha Al Jamal Senior Manager – Marketing 02 6194893

First Gulf Bank

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6816666 Head Office, Sh. Zayed Second Street, Khalidiya P.O. Box 6316, Abu DhabiWebsite: www.fbg.aeHistory: Established in 1979Shareholder Equity of over AED 10 billionSenior ManagementAbdulhamid Mohammed Saeed Managing Director 02 6920502Andre’ Sayegh Chief Executive Officer 02 6920506Amit Wanchoo Head of Retail Banking GroupArif Shaikh Chief Credit & Risk OfficerGeorge Abraham Head of Corporate BankingGopi Krishna Madhavan Head of Human Resources

Hana Al Rostamani Strategic Planning HeadKarim Karoui Head of Business Planning & Financial ControlNadeem A. Siddiqui Head of International BusinessShafiqur Rehman Adhami SR. VP, CB FI\SYN\MNC\OIL & Energy SectorZafar Habib Khan Chief Investment OfficerZulfiquar Ali Sulaiman Business Support Director

Habib Bank A.G. Zurich

Head Office: Zurich, SwitzerlandZonal Office: Dubai Tel 04 2214535Baniyas Square Deira, P.O. Box 3306 Fax 04 2284211E-mail: [email protected]: www.habibbank.comHistory: Established in 1967Reza S. Habib Joint President Arif Lakhani Chief Executive Vice President 04 2229985Asad Habib Senior EVPAfzal Memon Senior EVP Shariq Ali Senior EVPDeira Mains 04 2214535Najibullah Khan Branch Manager Farrukh Iqbal Deputy Branch Manager Corporate 04 3513777 Awais Hasan Branch ManagerSharjeel Vijdani Deputy Branch Manager Al Fahidi Street 04 3534545Zain Ghazali Branch ManagerAbdul Basheer Deputy Branch Manager Jebel Ali 04 8812828Nisar Chowdhary Branch Manager Ifthikhar Memon Deputy Branch ManagerSh.Zayed Branch 04 3313999Zia Abbas Mirza Branch ManagerKashif Aijaz Dodhy Deputy Branch Manager

Abu Dhabi Sh. Hamdan 02 6346888Imamat Naqvi Area Manager Farhan Bakhshy Branch Manager Al Falah 02 6422600Syed Akhtar Hussain Branch Manager Raid Saleem Ansari Deputy Branch Manager Sharjah 06 5730004Al Boorj Avenue Younus Warsi Area Manager Kausarullah Khan Branch Manager

Habib Bank limited

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6224688Main Branch, Corniche Road, P.O.Box 897, Abu Dhabi Fax 02 6225620E-mail: [email protected]: Established on August 25, 1941Nationalised on January 1, 1974 On June 1974 absorbed Habib Bank Ltd. On June 30, 1975 absorbed Standard Bank Ltd., KarachiAman Aziz Siddiqi EVP/RGM 04 3597753Mohammad Tanvir HR. Manager 04 3592292Fouad Farrukh GRM 04 3592214Sh. Abdul Basit AVP/CAD Manager 04 3592539M. Amin Usman AVP/Treasury 04 3591893Ahmed Faraz Faruqi VP/Head ICU 04 3592517Nadeem Zia VP/Head FINCON 04 3592292Syed Ali Gohar VP/IT/Head 04 3592820Abdul Shahid Khan VP/Head Cops 04 3591874Abu Dhabi


Sh. Zayed Road, 2nd Street Mushtaq H. Shah Service Manager 02 6344557Abu DhabiMain Branch M. Saadat Cheema VP/Chief Manager 02 6224655Al Ain 03 7642555Abdul Jalil Al Fahim Bldg.Adbul Hameed Khan AVP/Senior Manager 03 7642555Dubai Regional Office Sahibzada M. Taimur SVP/Corporate Manager 04 3596922Sameera Mohammad Service Manager 04 3592016Sheikh Zayed Road, Kalantar Tower Khalid Bin Shaheen SVP/Director 04 3431421Mahdi Hassan Business Development Manager 04 3438081Isar-Ul-Haq Service Manager 04 3438081Deira Branch, Creek Road Zulfiqar Ahmad Bhatti Service Manager 04 2253292Sharjah 06 5682552 / 5683473Al Boorj AvenueAssad Ali Shaikh AVP/Branch Manager 06 5695122Dhaid & Dibba 06 8822249Near Al Dhaid Police Station 06 8822249Abdul Sattar Badi Service Manager 06 8822249

HDFC Bank

Representative Office: Dubai Tel 04 3966991Juma Al Majid Bldg., Opp Bur Juman Centre Fax 04 3967010P O Box 64546, Email: [email protected] Saeed Cheif Representative Tel 04 3966991

HSBC Bank Middle East Ltd

Regional Management OfficeEmaar Square, Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai, P.O. Box 66 Tel 600 55 4722 Fax 04 4267397From outside the UAE + 971 600 55 4722Email : [email protected]. www.hsbc.ae

Simon Cooper Deputy Chairman & CEO, Middle East & N. AfricaAbdulfattah Sharaf CEO, UAEDeclan G Hegarty Head of Business, Abu Dhabi

IndusInd Bank

Dubai Representative Office Tel 04 3978803203, Safa Commercial Bldg. Fax 04 3978805Opp. Bur Juman Centre, P.O. Box: 111873, Dubai.E-mail: [email protected] Gupta Vice President & Chief Representative 04 3978804

ING Asia Private Bank Ltd

Dubai Representative Office Tel 04 4277100602, Level 6, Building 4 Fax 04 4257801Burj Dubai SquareSheikh Zayed RoadP.O Box 4296, Dubai – UAE Suresh Nanda Managing Director & HeadEric Lorentz Managing DirectorVarun Bukshi Executive Director

Melwyn Dias Executive Director

B.R. Subramanian DirectorP.G. Bhaskar DirectorRanjit Paul DirectorPiyush Bhandari DirectorNitin Bhatnagar DirectorRishi Chauhan DirectorAsad Dadarkar DirectorAshraf Al Yamani Director

InvestBank

Sharjah Tel 06 5694440Al Boorj Avenue, P.O. Box 1885 Fax 06-5694442E-mail: [email protected]: www.invest-bank.comHistory: Established on 2nd February 1975 as Investment Bank for Trade & Finance On July 1, 1995 name changed to Investbank.Sami Farhat General Manager Qasim Kazmi AGM. Operations & Treasury Taleb Zaarour Senior Manager-ADM & LegalAthar Anis Manager, Credit Risk Bassam Hollmerus Chief DealerSajjad H. Holimerus Trade FinanceMadhu Pilakazhi Financial Controller Ghassan Accari Personnel Manager Vinay Gupta IT ManagerDubai 04 3213131Sheikh Zayed RoadDubai 04 2285551Al Maktoum StreetAl Ain 03 7644446Al Ghaba StreetAbu Dhabi 02 6794594Sh. Khalifa streetAbu Dhabi 02 5555336Mussaffa Area Sharjah 06 5420333Industrial Area

Janata Bank Abu DhabiObied Sayah Al-Mansuri Building Tel No 02-6331400Electra Road, Post Box No. 2630 Fax : 02-6348749Email [email protected]. Md. Masuduzzaman Chief Executive 02-6344543Mr. Md. Chaynul Haque IT Manager/SPO 02-6340881Mr. Md. Ramjan Bahar System Administrator/PO 02-6340881 Abu DhabiMr. Mohamudul Hoque Manager 0 2-6344542DubaiMr. Md. Abdul Awal Manager Mohammad Saleh Al-Gurg Building 0 4-2281442Al-Borj Street, P.O. Box 3342Mr. Md. Mizanur Rahman ManagerSharjah Saqer Bin Rashid Al Quassim BuildingAl Suwaiheen Street, P.O. Box- 5303 0 6-5687032Mr. Md. Mizanur Rahman ManagerAl Ain Branch Mr. Md Shahadat Hossain ManagerSk. Khalifa Bin Mohd. Al-Nahyan Building, Main Market Centre, Main Street,P.O. Box- 1107 0 3-7513425


Lloyds TSB Bank plc

Dubai Main BranchAl Wasl Road, Opp. Safa Park Tel 04 3422000P.O. Box: 3766, Dubai, UAE Fax 04 3422660E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.lloydstsb.aeVivek Vohra Head of Corporate OriginationGiles Cunningham Regional Manager, UAE & Gulf States 04 3023267Bert de Ruiter Managing Director 04 3023267Steve Williams Consumer Banking Director 04 3023267 Jon Mortell Head of Corporate Banking 04 3023266Suresh Jadhwani Treasury Manager 04 3023256Tim Goddard Head of Operations and IT 04 3023250Derek Vaz Head of Finance and Planning 04 3023330Caroline Ridley HR Manager 04 3023270Steve Snowdon Head of Middle OfficeAlex de Melo Head of Treasury Trading Edson Suppo Head of Treasury Strategy & Risk Claire Thomas Head of Human Resources

Dubai Customer Service CentresCommunity Centre at Arabian Ranches, Dubai Tel 04 3023318 Fax 04 3618035Dubai Healthcare City (Behind Wafi City) Tel 04 3023349 Fax 04 3624805

Man Investments Middle East Limited

Representative Office Dubai Tel 04 3604999Level 5, West Wing, The Gate, Dubai Internaional Financial Centre Fax 04 3604900P.O. Box: 73221, DubaiWebsite: www.maninvestments.comE-mail: [email protected] Merville Chief Executive OfficerKamlesh Bhatia Deputy Chief Executive Officer

Mashreqbank

Dubai Tel 04 2223333Head Office, Omar Bin Al Khatab Street, Deira Fax 04 2226061P.O. Box 1250, Dubai History: Established on 1st May, 1967 as Bank of Oman Limited. On October 1st 1993 name was changed to MashreqBank PSC.bdullah Al Ghurair President and ChairmanAbdul Aziz Al Ghurair CEOAli Raza Khan Head of Corporate AffairsDouglas Beckett Head of Retail BankingOmar Bouhadiba Head of Investment and Corporate BankingNabeel Waheed Head of Treasury and Capital MarketsNigel Morgan Head of Audit Review & ComplianceMajid Husain Head of Financial InstitutionsSomnath Menon Head of Operations & TechnologyKantic DasGupta Head of Risk ManagementAlexander Sinclair Head of Technology Mubashar Khokhar CEO of Badr Al IslamiEbrahim Kazi Head of Marketing and Corporate CommunicationsSaad Hakim Events and Public Relations ManagerAl Khaleej Street, Deira 04 2717771Souq Al Kabir Branch 04 2264176Hor Al Anz, Deira 04 2623100Jumeirah Branch 04 3441600Jebel Ali 04 8815355Khor Branch 04 3534000Bur Juman Centre 04 3527103Al Riqa, Deira 04 2229131

Al Aweer 04 3333727Abu Dhabi 02 6274300Main Branch, Khalifa StreetMusaffa 02 5555051Zayed the 2nd Street 02 6334021Al Salam Street 02 6786500Al Mushrif 02 4432424Baniyas 02 5821100Muroor 02 4481858Khalidiya 02 6665757Al Ain 03 7667700Al Ain Main Street Ali Ibn Abi Tailb St. 03 7669968 Ajman 06 7422440Shk Humaid Bin Abdul Aziz Street, Near Ajman MuseumFujairah 09 2221100 Sh. Hamad StreetRas Al Khaimah 07 2361644King Faisal Street.Al Nakheel RAK 07 2281695Sharjah Main 06 5684366Bank Street, RollaKing Abdul Aziz Street 06 5730883Dhaid 06 8822899Main Street, Sh. Arsan Hameed Bldg., DhaidDibba 09 2444230Kalba 09 2777430Kalba CityKhorfakkan 09 2385295Umm Al Quwain 06 7666948 King Faisal Street, Next to New Souk

Merill Lynch International & Co.C.V

Representative Office Dubai (04) 3975555Business Center Building, Khalid Bin Walid StreetP.O. Box 3911, DubaiTelefax 04-3975252Executive Director Mones Bazzy

NATIXIS

Dubai Branch Tel 04 7026777DIFC Gate Village Fax 04 7026820Building No. 8, 5th FloorP.O Box 33770Email: [email protected]: www.natixis.frPhilippe Petitgas CEO

National Bank of Abu Dhabi

Head Office: Abu Dhabi 02 - 6111111One NBAD Tower, Khalifa St., P.O. Box 4, Abu DhabiTelex 22266/7 MASRIP EMHistory: Established in 1968H.E. KHALIFA MOHAMED AL KINDI ChairmanH.E. DR. JAUAN SALEM AL DHAHIRI Deputy ChairmanMICHAEL H. TOMALIN Chief ExecutiveABDULLA MOHAMMED SALEH ABDULRAHEEM GM & Chief Operating OfficerSAIF ALI MOHAMED MUNAKHAS AL SHEHHI GM Domestic Banking DivisionQAMBER ALI AL MULLA GM International Banking DivisionABHIJIT CHOUDHURY GM & Chief Risk OfficerJOHN GARRETT GM & Chief Audit & Compliance Officer


Abu DhabiMain Branch 02 - 6111111Khalidiya 02 - 6666800Dept. of Social Services & Commercial Buildings 02 - 6346673ADCO 02 - 6672642ADMA 02 - 6263225ADNOC 02 - 6669143Abu Dhabi Municipality 02 - 6744749NPCC 02 - 5549282 ZADCO 02 - 6768821HILTON 02 - 6812280Abu Dhabi International Airport 02 - 5757303Sheikh Rashed Bin Saeed Al Maktoum Road 02 - 6419800Abu Dhabi Mall 02 - 6452200Arabian Gulf Road 02 - 4478878Baniyas 02 - 5831625Bateen 02 - 6658332Between The Two Bridges Area 02 - 5589446Corniche 02 - 6220300Dalma Island 02 - 8781240TAMM 02 - 8945528Das Island 02 - 8731099Liwa 02 - 8822388Madinat Zayed 02 - 8846146Government Complex 02 - 8945428Al Mirfaa 02 - 8836506Al Ruwais 02 - 8776343Al Muroor 02 - 4481918Mussafah 02 - 5553357Dept. of Social Services & Commercial Buildings (Mussafah) 02 - 5520681Mussafah Municipality 02 - 5540300Industrial City of Abu Dhabi 02 - 5501125Al Salam St. 02 - 6442900Al Shahama 02 - 5632411New Al Shahama 02 - 5635695Abu Dhabi Municipality-Shahama 02 - 5631385Sweihan 03 - 7347919Marina Mall 02 - 6816002Al Etihad 02 - 6111111Emirates Palace 02 - 6908900National Exhibition Centre 02 - 4494996Mina Road 02 - 6767665

Al AlinAl Ain Clock Tower 03 - 7642400Al Ain 03 - 7516900Al Ain Cement Factory 03 - 7828060Al Ain International Airport 03 - 7855511Al Ain Defence 03 - 7688824Al Sanaiya 03 - 7213222Al Hayer 02 - 7322400Al Ain Mall 03 - 7519900

AjmanAjman 06 - 7422996

DubaiDeira 04 - 2226141Dubai Side 04 - 3599111Jebel Ali 04 - 8815655Sh. Zayed Road 04 - 3433311 Al Qusais 04 - 2674176Jumeirah 04 - 3499001Mall of the Emirates 04 - 3413888

FujairahFujairah 09 - 2222458Dibba 09 - 2444223

Ras Al KhaimahAl Nakheel 07 - 2281753 Ras Al Khaimah 07 - 2334333

SharjahAl Bourj Avenue 06 - 5695500Sharjah 06 - 5721111Al Falah Camp Office 06 - 5385969Al Dhaid 06 - 8822929Khorfakkan 09 - 2385250Kalba 09 - 2772112

Umm Al QuwainUmm Al Quwain 06 - 7660033

National Bank of Bahrain

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6335288Khalaf Bin Ahmed Al Otaiba Building, Sh. Hamdan Street Fax 02 6333783P.O.Box 46080Email: [email protected]: www.nbbonline.com

Farouk Khalaf UAE Country Manager 02 6335299Ingersoll Ramalingam Manager Credit 02 6311248

National Bank of Dubai

Dubai Tel 04 2222111Head Office Baniyas Street, Deira Fax 04 2283000P.O. Box 777 Email: [email protected]: www.nbd.comHistory: Established in1963 as National Bank of Dubai Limited. In 1994 name was changed to National Bank of Dubai.

R. Douglas Dowie CEOJoyshil Mitter CFOAlex Richardson COOLeslic Rice CROAbdul Shakoor Tahlak CM - Intl.Ghanim Bin Zaal CM - Business DevelopmentAli Al Najjar CM - LiabilitySuvo Sarkar Head of RetailRajesh Thaper Head Of CorporateFaranak Foroughi Head of TPOHusam Al Sayad Head of HRG. Krishnamoorthy TreasurerSue Evans Head of IS&TAlan M. Smith Head of Group AuditA. Chandran Head of BPQMWalid El Masri Head of Corp CommRashmi Malik Head of StrategyAbdul Fattah Sharaf GM NFSMohamed Al Neaimi GM AqaratAli Kaitoob Head of Dist. RetailP.S. Sastry SM CEO’s OfficeHesham Qassimi Divisional Manager Corporate Banking

Abu Dhabi P.O. Box: 386 Tel : 02 6394555 Fax : 02 6346767Ajman P.O. Box: 712 Tel : 06 7456555 Fax : 06 7456060Ajman Archives Tel : 06 7444606 Fax : 06 7425883Al Mizhar Tel : 04 2641221 Fax : 04 2640569


Al Ain P.O. Box: 16122 Tel : 03 7644345 Fax : 03 7668515Burjuman Centre Tel : 04 3555222 Fax : 04 3554455Bullion Tel : 04 2284757 Fax : 04 2289090Convention Centre Branch Tel : 04 3320808 Fax : 04 3320908Dubai Central Fruit & Vgtbl. Mkt Branch Al Awir Tel : 04 3333880 Fax : 04 3333870Dubai International Airport Tel : 04 2200404 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai International Airport Pay Office Tel : 04 2164946 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Internation Airport Tel : 04 2162450 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Internation Airport Tel : 04 2166995 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Internation Airport Tel : 04 2162452 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Internation Airport Tel : 04 2162434 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Internation Airport Tel : 04 2162740 Fax : 04 2244614Dubai Media City Pay Office Tel : 04 3902007 Fax : 04 3908855Deira City Centre Tel : 04 2951555 Fax : 04 2951525Dubai Airline Centre Tel : 04 2952555 Fax : 04 2955655Dubai Airport Free Zone Tel : 04 2995550 Fax : 04 2995557Dubai Courts Tel : 04 3366702 Fax : 04 3353906Dubai Media City Pay Office Tel : 04 3030400 Fax : 04 3908855Emirates Tower Tel : 04 3300133 Fax : 04 3300155Fahidi Tel : 04 3535575 Fax : 04 3535575 Emirates Tower Tel : 04 3530308 Fax : 04 3534601Emirates Tower Tel : 04 2823400 Fax : 04 2823640Fahidi Direct Banking Tel : 04 3532840 Fax : 04 3531443Fujairah Branch P.O. Box: 1744 Tel : 09 2233335 Fax : 09 2233336Hamriya Tel : 04 2663189 Fax : 04 2690103Hatta Tel : 04 8523183 Fax : 04 8521051Ibn Battuta Mall Branch Tel : 04 3685499 Fax : 04 3685501Ittihad Road Tel : 04 2955600 Fax : 04 2955611Jumeirah Branch Tel : 04 3420202 Fax : 04 3421112Jebel Ali Tel : 04 8816087 Fax : 04 8816961Main Office Tel : 04 2222111 Fax : 04 2283000Maktoom Branch Tel : 04 2281141 Fax : 04 2235456Malleq Emirates Branch Tel : 04 3410777 Fax : 04 3410707Muhaissnah Branch Tel : 04 2544545 Fax : 04 2544646Nadd Al Shiba Tel : 04 3363939 Fax : 04 3363788Oud Metha Branch (Ex-Gulf Tower Branch) Tel : 04 3370222 Fax : 04 3366145Ras Al Kaimah P.O. Box : 1932 Tel : 07 2279888 Fax : 07 2279889Rashidiya Tel : 04 2859523 Fax : 04 2854847Souk Madinat Jumeirah Branch Tel : 04 3686130 Fax : 04 3686195Sh. Zayed Road (Saeed Tower) Tel : 04 3313183 Fax : 04 3310629Sharjah P.O. Box : 21850 Tel : 06 5738888 Fax : 06 5733000Umm Al Quwain P.O. Box : 22 Tel : 06 7656154 Fax : 06 7655151Emirates Tower Tel : 06 7656152 Fax : 04 3300155Umm Suqeim Tel : 04 3485222 Fax : 04 3482535

National Bank of Oman

Abu Dhabi Bin Sagar Towers, Najda Street Tel 02 6348111 / 6323456P.O. Box 3822 Fax 02 6325027Ravi S. Khot Country Manager 02 6393028Salim Al Khanjri Manager - Operations 02 6392535Minhajuddin Niazi Manager - Consumer Banking & Business Development 02 6326560K.K. Gambhir Manager - Corporate Banking 02 6394922

National Bank of Umm Al Qaiwain

History: Established in 198224/7 Call Centre Number: 600 56 56 56 E-mail: [email protected] Website: www.nbq.aeSh. Nasser Bin Rashid Al-Moalla Managing Director Mohamed Abdel Rahim Al Mulla General Manager

Umm Al Qaiwain Branch Tel: 06 7066666NBQ Building, King Faisal Street Fax: 06 706 6677

P.O.Box 800, Umm Al QaiwainFalaj Al Mualla Branch Tel: 06 8824447NBQ Building, Shaikh Zayed Street Fax: 06 8824445P.O.Box 11074 Falaj Al MuallaDubai Branches Tel: 04 3976655NBQ Building, Khalid Bin Al Waleed Street Fax: 04 3975382P.O. Box 9715 Dubai Deira Branch Tel: 04 2651222Opposite Dubai Police Head Quaiter Fax: 04 2651333Al Ittihad Street, P.O. Box 8898 Deira, Abu Dhabi BranchHamdan Bin Mohammed Street (# 5) Tel: 02 6775100P.O. Box 3915 Abu Dhabi Fax: 02 6779644Mussafah Branch Tel: 02 5555088P.O. Box 9770 Abu Dhabi Fax: 02 5553559Al Ain Branch Tel: 03 3751300Oud Al Touba Street Fax: 03 7513500Al Mandoos RoundaboutP.O. Box 17888 Al AinSharjah Branch Tel: 06 5742000King Faisal Street, Fax: 06 5742200P.O.Box 23000 SharjahNBQ Kiosk Fax: 06 5742200Sharjah Mega MallP.O.Box 23000 SharjahAjman BranchesCity Center Branch Tel: 06 7436000Ajman City Center Fax: 06 7436060P.O.Box 4133 AjmanMasfout Branch Tel: 04 8523377 NBQ Building Fax: 04 8523093Main Street P.O.Box 12550 Masfout, AjmanFujairah Branch Tel: 09 2232100Fujairah Insurance Co. Building Fax: 09 2232220Hamad Bin Abdulla RoadP.O.Box 1444 FujairahRas Al Khaimah Branch Tel: 07 2366444Corniche Al Qawasim Road Fax: 07 2364470P.O.Box 32253Ras Al Khaimah

Philippine National Bank

Dubai Representative Office Room 108, Al Nakheel Bldg., Zabeel Road, Karama Tel 04 3365940P.O. Box 52357, Dubai, UAE Fax 04 3374474E-mail: [email protected] Tillah Rasul First Vice President & Regional Representative

Rafidain BankAbu Dhabi Tel 02 6335882 / 3 Al Nasser Street, Glass Bldg. Fax 6326996P.O.Box 2727, Abu Dhabi Salah Mahid Branch Manager

Royal Bank of Canada

Dubai Representative Office Tel 04 3313196API World Tower, Suite 1002, Shk. Zayed Road, P.O. Box: 3614. Telefax 04 3313960Umaima Zaman senior managerAshwani.k.Dewitt senior managerGlobal Private BankingAshish Anand Chief Representative


RAK Bank

Ras Al Khaimah Head Office, Oman Street, Al Nakheel Tel 07 2281127P.O. Box 5300 Fax 07 2283238E-mail: [email protected]; www.rakbank.aeHistory: Established in 1976 as The National Bank of Ras Al Khaimah. In 2003, name was changed to RAKBANK

H.E. Sheikh Omar Bin Saqr Al Qasimi ChairmanH.E. Sheikh Salim Bin Sultan-Al-Qasimi DirectorMr. Hamad Abdulaziz Al Sagar DirectorMr. Essa Ahmed Abu Shuraija Al Neaimi DirectorMr. Majid Saif Al Ghurair DirectorMr. Ali Samir Al Shihabi DirectorMr. Yousuf Obaid Essa DirectorMr. Graham Honeybill General ManagerMr. Ian Hodges Head of Personal BankingMr. Anil Sukhia Head of Corporate BankingMr. Steve O Hanlon Chief Operating OfficerMr. Kunal Chowdry Head of Internal ControlsMr. Jose Braganza Head of CreditMr. Malcolm D’Souza Head of TreasuryMr. Ramakrishna K S Head of AuditMrs. Susan Gardner Head of Human ResourcesMr. Dharmesh Pandya Head of FinanceDubaiDeira Maktoum Branch Tel : 04-2248000Gold Souk Branch Tel : 04-2248000Umm Hurair Branch (Bur Dubai) Tel : 04-2248000Oud Metha ( Dubai Main Branch) Tel : 04-2248000Sheikh Zayed Road Branch Tel : 04-2248000Emaar Business Park Branch Tel : 04-2248000Marina Diamond Branch Tel : 04-2248000Al Quoz Branch Tel : 04-2248000Ibn Battuta Mall Branch Tel : 04-2248000Mirdiff Branch Tel : 04-2248000Al Qusais Branch Tel : 04-2248000SharjahSharjah Main Branch Tel : 06-5988020Sharjah Industrial Area Tel : 06-5988200AjmanAjman Branch Tel : 06-5988266East CoastKalba Branch Tel : 09-2039500Khorafakkan Branch Tel : 09-2039550Al AinAl Ain Branch Tel : 03-7029000Abu DhabiAbu Dhabi-Tourist Club Branch Tel : 02-4127100Khalidiya Branch Tel : 02-4127600Mussafah Branch Tel : 02-4127300Ras Al KhaimahRAK Town Branch Tel : 07-2062211Sha’am Branch Tel : 07-2062333 Badr Branch Tel : 07-2062411Al Manael Branch Tel : 04-2913964Al Rams Branch Tel : 07-2062366Al Dhait Branch Tel : 07-2062266Al Nakheel Branch Tel : 07-2062222

The Royal Bank of Scotland N.V.

Head Office: Edinburgh, United KingdomDubai Branch,

Regional Hub for UAE and Middle East Tel: 04 3512200P.O. Box: 2567, Khalid bin Waleed Street, Dubai, UAE Fax: 04 3511555Phone Banking: 04 4266000 Dubai Branch:Simon Penney Country Executive 04 5062601Burhan Khan Head of Regional Markets 04 5062801

Abu Dhabi Tel: 02 6963000Corner of Hamdan and Salam Streets Fax: 02 6963001P.O. Box: 2720, Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates

Sharjah Tel: 06 5594900Abdul Aziz Al Majid Building, King Faisal Street Fax: 02 6963001P.O. Box: 1971, Sharjah, United Arab Emirates

Sharjah Islamic Bank

Mohammed Abdalla Chief Executive Officer 06-5115116Ahmed Saad ibrahim Chief Operating Officer 06-5115118Mohammed Rizwan Chief Risk Officer 06-5115172Saeed M Ahmed Al Amiri Head, Investment Group 06-5115000Ossama Salah El Din Head, Retail Banking 06-5115339G . Ramkirshinan Head of Coroprate Banking Group 06-5115111Hussam A. Abu Aisheh SVP-Chief Internal Audit 06-5115153Mohammed Ishaq Chief Dealer 06-5115151Mohamed Azmeer Head of Credit Division 06-5115319Eman Jasim Sajwani Head of Human Resources Group 06-5115170Myron Britto Head, nformation Technology Div.-CIO 06-5115444Sufyan Maysara Head of Shariaa Supervision Divison 06-5115213BranchesMain Branch - Al Brooj Avenue Mohammed Yousif 06-5115121King Faisal Street Branch Abdul Salam Al Ali 06-5746805Ladies Branch Laila Ali Salem 06-5746807American Unversity Branch Mohd Mousa Ali 06-5585789Al Dhaid Branch Khalid M. Ajmani 06-8829414Industrial Area Branch Waleed Abdul Qadir 06-5397623Sharjah Expo Branch Jassim Al Awadi 06-5992502Sharjah Buhaira Branch Osama Ahmed AlSalman N/AKhorfakhan Branch Yousif M. Abdullah 09-2387490Dibba Branch Ali Al-Abdouli 09-2442601Kalba Branch Abdullah Bin Hikal 09-2774204Fujairah Branch Nawal Mohamed AlMaghribi 09-2244339Dubai Branch Mohamed Ibrahim Alghufili 04-2698322Sheikh Zayed Branch Maisoon Zainudin 04-3217543Al Twar Branch Maha AlBanna 04-2638335Abu Dhabi Branch Thomas P.Y. 02-6224166Al Ain Branch Majid Sha’abaan 03-7513200

Shuaa Capital PSC

Head Office Tel: 04 3303600/ 04 3199778Emirates Towers Hotel, Level 7 Fax: 04 3303550P.O. Box: 31045, Dubai, UAE.Website: www.shuaacapital.com Iyad Duwaji CEOAbeer Ayash Marketing and PR coordinator

Societe Generale

Dubai DIFC Gate Village, Bldg. 6, 4th Floor Tel.: 04 4257500Sheikh Zayed Road, Dubai Fax: 04 3653170


Website: www.socgen.com Alain L. Tave Chief Regional Representative

Standard Bank Plc - Dubai Branch (DIFC)

Dubai Emirates Tower, Office-16 B Tel 04 3300011P.O. Box 504904 Fax 04 3300169Website: www.standardbank.comJeffrey Rhodes General Manager 04 3300164Kate Lunjevich Head of Compliance & Operations

Standard Chartered Bank

Head Office: United KingdomDubai Main Branch Tel 04 3520455 Head Office: Al Fardan Building, Fax 04 3528648 Mankhool Road, Bur Dubai P.O. Box: 999, Dubai - United Arab Emirates www.standardchartered.aePhone Banking: 600 522 288 (24 hours)Dubai Branch P. O. Box 999, Al Mankool Road, Dubai , UAE 04-3520455Deira Branch P. O. Box 1125, Baniyas Square, Dubai, 04-5085300Al Ras Souq BranchP. O. Box 64555, Al Ras Souq, Dubai , UAE 04-5085366Dubai Mall BranchP. O. Box 127899, LG level, Dubai, UAE 04-5085753Emaar Business Park BranchP. O. Box 103669,Building 3, Dubai, UAE 04-5085255Jebel Ali BranchP. O. Box 16920 , Downtown Jebel Ali, Dubai , UAE 04-5085200Dragon Mart BranchP. O. Box 4166, Dragon Mart mall, Dubai, UAE 04-5085260Al Ain BranchP. O. Box 1240, Near Clock Tower, Al Ain, UAE 03-7056800Khalidiya BranchP. O. Box 241, Crystal Tower, Abu Dhabi, UAE 02-6165600Sharjah BranchP. O. Box 5, Al Boorj Avenue, Sharjah , UAE 06-5916100

The Housing Bank for Trade & Finance

Abu Dhabi P.O. Box 44768 Tel 02 6268855/6270280 Fax 02 6271771Muhanad Habashneh Representative

Union de Banques Arabes et Francaises UBAF

Dubai Creek Tower, Baniyas Road, Deira Tel 04 2284080P.O. Box 29885 Fax 04 2284070Hamed Hassouna Chief Representative GCC & Yemen

UBS AG

Abu Dhabi ADNIC Bldg., 5th Floor, Sh. Khalifa Street Tel 02 6275024P.O.Box 3744 Fax 02 6272752Website: www.ubs.com

Roger Leitner Senior Representative

DubaiCreek Tower, Office 17A, Baniyas Road, Deira 04 2240044Peter Schaer Senior Representative 04 2220006

DIFC Gate Village, Bldg. No. 6, 5th Floor Tel.: 04 3657150Sheikh Zayed Road Fax: 04 3657191P.O Box 506542Per Larsson Senior Representative

Union National Bank

Abu Dhabi Tel 02 6741600Head Office, Salam Street, P.O.Box 3865, Abu Dhabi Fax 02 6786080Website: www.unb.aeHistory: Established as a Public Joint Stock Company in 1982Nahyan Bin Mubarak Al Nahyan ChairmanMohammad Nasr Abdeen Chief Executive OfficerAbu Dhabi Corniche 02 632 1600City Centre 02 627 3471Najda 02 632 4981Hazzaa 02 641 2288Khalidiya 02 635 2511Adgas Booth 02 627 0611Musaffah 02 555 9111Shahama 02 563 4600Baneyas 02 582 1886Al Dhafra/Madinat Zayed 08 884 8484Al Muroor 02 444 8384Al AinSh. Khalifa Street 03 7644551Al Jimi 03 7626240DubaiMain Branch, Deira 04 2211188 Al Maktoum Street 04 2232266Khalid Bin Al Waleed Road 04 3516444Al Bustan 04 2636388Jebel Ali 04 8810999Sheikh Zayed Road/Jumeira 04 3329911Rashidiya 04 2857686

Ajman Central - Emirates Post 06 7425552Fujairah 09 2222747Ras Al Khaimah 07 2286600Sharjah 06 5686141King Abdul Aziz 06 5746161

United Arab Bank

General Management & H.O. Tel 06 5733900Sh. Abdulla Bin Salim Al Qassimi Building, Al Qasimia St., Sharjah Fax 06 5733906E-Mail Address [email protected] www.uab.aeHistory: Established 1975

Bertrand Giraud General Manager 06 5733900Awni Alami Dy. General Manager 06 5733900Gibert Hie Asst. GM-Corporate & Retail 06 5733900Arif Premdjee Asst. GM-Admin. & Finance 06 5733900


United Bank Limited

Dubai Gargosh Bldg, Khalid Bin Waleed Street Tel 04 3552020P.O. Box 1367, Dubai Fax 04 3514525Email: [email protected]: www.ubl.com.pkWajahat Husain Head of Middle EastMaruf Ahmed General Manager UAE

Wachovia Bank National Assoc.

Representative Office Dubai The Atrium Centre, Khalid Bin Waleed Street, Bur Dubai 04 3556244P.O. Box 53089 Fax 3557117Head Office: USAJ.Kennedy Thompson Chairman & Chief Executive Officer Michael P. Heavener International DivisionDubai Branch:Chafic Haddad Vice President & Regional Manager Carol Hampson Customer Services Representative

Documents

34143343 Banking Business Review May 10