Dr Karim El Solh

Co-Founder & CEO at Gulf Capital

Speaker

Dr. Karim El Solh is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Gulf Capital, one of the largest and most established alternative asset management firms in the Gulf region. The Firm has a 20 year track record of deploying capital in the GCC and has invested over $3 billion across various alternative asset classes including private equity, private debt and real estate. Under Dr. El Solh’s leadership, Gulf Capital has been associated with some of the region’s most prominent private equity and mezzanine transactions and has won numerous awards including Best Private Equity Firm and Best Private Debt Firm in the Middle East by Banker Middle East and Private Equity International. Dr. El Solh is the Chairman of the Global Private Capital Association Middle East Council.

Dr. El Solh has served as the Chairman or Co-Chairman of Geidea, ART Fertility, Metito Holdings and Maritime Industrial Services and as the Director of Emirates Auction, Gulf Marine Services, Middle East Glass, Ma’arif for Education & Training, Reach Group, Depa Group, Metamed, the Galleria Mall Al Maryah Island, Antara Residential Project, NAS TPA and Aramex.

Dr Karim El Solh recently joined some of the world’s leading CEOs in supporting His Majesty King Charles III’s Terra Carta and Sustainable Markets Initiative, which provides a roadmap for businesses to move towards a sustainable future by 2030. The charter’s vision to help Non-business build an inspiring, inclusive, equitable, prosperous, and sustainable future. He is a member of the Private Equity Taskforce and Asset Manager and Asset Owner Taskforce within the Sustainable Markets Initiative.

Prior to founding Gulf Capital, Dr El Solh was the CEO of the leading UAE investment bank, The National Investor. Under his leadership, the Firm was involved in a number of groundbreaking private equity transactions and was ranked as the number one IPO underwriter in the Gulf. While at the National Investor, he led some of the region’s groundbreaking IPOs including the Aldar, Surouh, Abaar and Aramex IPOs. Dr El Solh was also a Co-Founder of the European High Yield Capital Markets/Leveraged Buy-Outs division at Donaldson, Lufkin and Jenrette (DLJ – now part of Credit Suisse) and a senior investment banker in charge of equity offerings at Citigroup.

Dr. El Solh has a B.S. in civil engineering from Cornell University, an MBA from Georgetown University and a doctorate in economics from the Institut d'Etudes Politiques de Paris (Sciences Po). He is also a Chartered Management Accountant and a Professional Civil Engineer. He is on the Board of Advisors of Georgetown University’s McDonough School of Business, a Board member of Georgetown’s Psaros Center for Financial Markets and Policy, a Board Member of the Georgetown EMBA Dubai program, a member of Georgetown’s AI, Analytics and the Future of Work Initiative Advisory Group and on the Board of Trustees of the Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Foundation (ADMAF). Dr. El Solh has been named as one of the Top 100 CEOs in the Gulf by CEO Magazine, one of the 500 Most Influential Arabs by Arabian Business Magazine and a Young Global Leader by the World Economic Forum.