Hadi Al Hakim is a seasoned finance professional with more than 24 years of European and Middle Eastern experience in investment banking, private equity, strategy, management consulting and corporate operations. Hadi is currently the owner and CEO of International Trading Franchises (ITF), a premier F&B retailer in the UAE & Qatar.
Hadi started his career as an investment banker and has led and managed the execution of a variety of public and private cross-border M&A transactions with a total value exceeding AED 15 Billion. He has worked across transaction execution, post-acquisition management and advisory roles.
He has served on the boards of several companies in the Middle East, advising shareholders on strategic alternatives achieving optimal M&A scenarios, re-organizations, disposals, and capital raising solutions involving equity and debt financing.
Prior to setting up his own business, Hadi held several senior positions with Dubai Islamic Bank as Head of Direct Investments, Alpen Capital as Executive Director, NBK Capital as Vice President and Ernst & Young in London.
The firm has a deep understanding of the global commodity trade trends and has access to a wide network of trade partners globally, willing to participate in secured and opportunistic trade deals.
Using this knowledge and network, the firm successfully runs Structured Trade Finance programs for several clients globally.
To offer their advisory clients structuring and wealth preservation solutions, the firm has partnered with a number of channel partners, who offer services, such as:
Provizia Capital’s partners have extensive experience in working with leading global and regional investment banking and advisory firms such as: Merrill Lynch, KPMG, E&Y and Alpen Capital; and leading Middle Eastern Asset Management firms such as: Rasmala Investment Bank and Emirates Financial Services (Asset Management arm of Emirates NBD Bank).
In addition, over the past few years, the firm has developed a deep understanding of the global commodity trading trends and have successfully partnered with several trading conglomerates and financiers to run Structured Trade Finance programs for several clients globally.
Provizia’s Transaction Support Services include, but not limited to:
Provizia Capital has offices in the UAE, Singapore and the UK.
In addition, the firm has partnered with multiple channel partners and service providers across several other locations for wider market coverage and better service offerings to meet their client’s unique requirements.
Given their years of experience in client management and service delivery, the Provizia team spends considerable amount of time, in first understanding their client’s specific needs, and then crafting tailor-made solutions to suit their specific requirements.
Every transaction regardless of its size and complexity is treated with equal care and finesse.
Provizia’s Corporate Advisory Services offering includes, but is not limited to:
Provizia’s client base is spread across: Southeast Asia, Indian Sub-continent, Middle East, the UK and Americas.
Senior Analyst
Samiya joined Provizia in 2021 as part of the Corporate Advisory team. She brings with her over 6 years of experience in property mortgages, business development and head hunting.
Prior to joining Provizia and moving to the UAE, Samiya worked with Vertex Finserve in Mumbai (India), specializing in property mortgages. Her roles and responsibilities included sales, legal review of paperwork and documentation. Prior to that, she worked with Unicorn Enterprises in Mumbai (India) in their business development department. Prior to that, she also spent 2 years in working in a head-hunting firm called, Aarian Inc., where she was responsible for identifying new companies for tie-ups for recruitments.
Samiya is a Bachelor of Law and Bachelor of Commerce from University of Mumbai.
Senior Analyst
Nagarjun joined Provizia in 2023 as part of the Corporate Advisory team. He brings with him over 5 years of experience in corporate advisory, factoring and finance.
Prior to joining Provizia, Nagarjun worked with Modifi, a leading factoring solutions provider. Prior to that he was working with Nimai Management Consultants, a UAE based corporate advisory firm specializing in debt advisory. At Nimai, Nagarjun worked as a credit analyst as well as a business development executive.
Nagarjun is a Bachelor of Commerce from Curtin University, Australia.
Co-Founder & Managing Partner (Asia)
Rahul is a highly experience financial services professional with over 20 years of experience in Structured Trade Finance, Real Estate Investments, Asset Management and Legacy Planning across Asia and the Middle East.
Prior to setting-up Provizia, Rahul was a co-founder in a DIFC company, where he was the architect of setting-up a highly successful Universal Life Insurance business and was instrumental in forging strong relationships with the product providers and premium financing banks. Prior to that, Rahul conceptualized and successfully exited a number of entrepreneurial ventures in the health & wellness and events management space.
Prior to becoming an entrepreneur, Rahul worked with Rasmala Investments, a Middle Eastern asset management company, where he co-managed assets of over US$ 250 Mn. He also worked with Emirates Financial Services, the Asset Management & Investment Bank arm of Emirates NBD bank, where he was part of the team that managed the bank’s proprietary investments.
Rahul holds an MBA in Finance from SP Jain Centre of Management and is a Bachelor of Commerce from Kolkata University, India.
Reginald Randall (‘Reg’) is a highly experienced Management Consultant in the FMCG space with over 20 years of experience of working in Asia, Africa and the Middle East.
Reg specializes in business turnarounds and in providing expert consulting, research, and actionable go-to-market strategies to clients, including financial due diligence, SWOT analysis, and timely market strategies in the manufacturing, distribution, and B2B/B2C applications.
As President, CEO and Country Manager across leading companies, Reg has an enviable track record of driving FMCG companies to record levels of sales, market share and profitability. Some of his notable turnaround assignments include:
Korea: Reg was a part of a team that was parachuted to set-up a world class Coca-Cola bottler out of a fragmented group of firms acquired locally. Reg was rapidly promoted through sales then marketing leadership roles and he ultimately rose to become President/Managing Director – with full P&L authority for the group – and drove a nearly 4X increase in EBITDA on sales of some US$500 Million.
Sudan: As Country Manager of a US$ 100+ Million, 1,300 employee Coca-Cola bottler, Reg reversed a multi-year sales decline and delivered the highest profitability in the company’s history.
UAE: As the CEO of Masafi, a leading Middle Eastern foods and soft drinks business, he increased distribution productivity by over 70%. In addition, with the help of his IT team, he designed and introduced the world’s first order, sales and delivery system based on android phones. As a result of these and many other innovative initiatives, the company’s profits increased to 4x of its previous levels.
Reg’s talent is not limited to tweaking existing KPIs and systems to wring out incremental growth. His real value addition emerges in situations where systems don’t exist or are broken and where innovation and attention to detail are key.
Reg holds his Bachelor of Science in Agricultural Production from the University of Natal in South Africa. He has completed coursework with Harvard Business School on “Strategy: Building & Sustaining Competitive Advantage”, participated in the Management, Business Administration & Finance program at Barlow Rand, and is a graduate of the Leadership Training Program at Dale Carnegie Institute.
Rajesh Balasubramanian (‘Bala’) is a veteran in Structured Trade Finance with over 25 years of experience in this space. He is currently the MD & CEO of Alzys Global Pte. Ltd., a leading trading company based in Singapore, which he co-founded in 2007. Alzys is enrolled on iE Singapore Global Traders Programme (‘GTP’).
Prior to setting-up his own trading enterprise, Bala held senior positions with Marubeni Itochu in Japan for 6 years and with Tionale Enterprises in Singapore for 5 years.
Bala holds a Post Graduate Management Degree from Indian Institute of Management (‘IIM’) Calcutta and a Bachelor in Engineering from VNIT Nagpur, India.
Bobby Rakhit (‘Bobby’) brings over 25 years of experience in investment banking and wealth creation. As a result of the successes of his initial investments in fintech and other investments, Bobby set-up his family office, ICP Capital (‘ICP’), focusing on wealth preservation and value creation. Over the years, ICP has set-up a dedicated investment arm in the alternative investments space, mainly focusing on Private Debt and Trade Finance.
Prior to setting up ICP, Bobby was the MD for Middle East, Asia & Africa for FactSet, a premier provider of global financial solutions. His role encompassed developing systematic investment processes for both the investment management and investment banking communities. Prior to FactSet, Bobby spent over a decade in investment banking working with HSBC, U.S. Bancorp Piper Jaffray and Morgan Stanley. During his investment banking stint, Bobby worked on some of the largest deals and public offerings during the dot com era such as AOL Time Warner.
Bobby is a regular guest on CNBC, NDTV Profit, Al Jazeera, and Bloomberg TV. In addition, he is a guest lecturer at several universities, guest speaker at key conferences and an active board member of several technology and real estate companies.
Bobby is a CFA charter holder, an MBA in Finance from University of Windsor and a Bachelor in Commerce from McGill University, Canada.
To ensure that the firm’s clients get best in class service for their specific financing, trade finance or legacy planning needs, Provizia has forged strategic partnerships with reputable channel partners and service providers globally.
These partnerships could be for market coverage, service offerings, product offering, placement capabilities or simply for shared capabilities.
Over the years, the firm’s partners have:
Advisory Board Member
Rishi is a highly experienced Management Consultant having worked over 20 years across leading investment banks in the UK.
Rishi works with HSBC Bank as a Project Specialist. Prior to joining HSBC, Rishi worked as a freelance Management Consultant specializing in Programme Management, successfully running and implementing a number of highly strategic and large assignments for leading global investment banks such as Citigroup, Lloyds Banking Group and Royal Bank of Scotland. Rishi was involved in the RBS-ABN merger integration project as well.
Prior to his stint as a freelance Management Consultant, Rishi worked in the Capital Markets team at Accenture, where he led assignments for clients such as Allied Irish Bank (AIB), ABN and Deutsche. Prior to that he spent a number of years working with Citigroup, managing projects in Finance, Risk Management and Information Re-engineering.
Rishi’s areas of expertise include: Management Consulting, Programme/Project Management, Finance, Risk, Asset Management, Operations, Off-shoring, amongst others.
Rishi holds an MSc in Finance from Brunel University, UK as well as a BSc in Mathematics from Queen Mary and Westfield College, UK.
Co-Founder & Managing Partner (Middle East)
Ritesh is a highly experienced Investment Banking professional with over 23 years of experience of working in the Middle East and India.
Ritesh is a specialist in capital raising using debt, equity and hybrid structures, advising clients on buy-side and sell-side M&A deals, negotiating JVs and partnerships, and offering bespoke solutions on corporate structuring and corporate re-organization. Over the years, Ritesh has raised over USD 3.5 Bn in Debt and USD 4.0 Bn in Equity for clients across the world.
Prior to setting-up his own corporate advisory practice, Ritesh worked with leading global investment banks and advisory firms such as: Merrill Lynch, E&Y and KPMG and with a Regional advisory firm, Alpen Capital.
Ritesh holds an MBA in Finance from the University of Western Australia. He is also a qualified Chartered Accountant from India and a Bachelor of Commerce from Delhi University, India.
