Racha Alkhawaja

Managing Partner at Gate Capital

Interviewee

C-Suite leader with over 25 years of solid expertise in Capital Markets, Fund Management, Investments, and Corporate Finance in cross-asset class. Strong International and MENASA expertise with exceptional ongoing success in growing, building, and managing new business lines driving stakeholders’ returns.

Selected as one of Top 50 Most Influential Women in Finance in the Middle East by Financial News, and one of the top 50 Women Of Influence in the Arab World by CEO ME, and with vast experience of leadership executive management roles in public and private leading firms, Racha has well-established accomplishments in financial management, team building and strong technical competencies, receiving several awards for her achievements.

Highly experienced in structuring complex private equity transactions and fund raising, Racha has an extensive network in Europe, Mena region and Asia, across International Institutions, Family Offices, DFIs, MDBs and Investment firms. Racha has exposure to VC and start-ups through her various engagements.

Currently the Managing Director of Gate Capital, a leading advisory and Corporate Finance house in the Middle East, Racha is also a Non-Executive Director at Polen Capital, a US based fund management company with AUM over $60bn and also sits on the advisory board of Imperial College, London.

She has previously held executive posts including, CEO of TPL Investment Management Ltd, an ADGM fund manager, focused on ESG and SDG linked asset management in Emerging and Frontier markets, as well as Board Director in TPL RMC and member of their audit committee.

Racha was also Co-Founder and Chairwoman of the Board of Reach NPIO, a leading DIFC non-profit mentoring organization for advancing professional women empowerment in business.

She previously held senior posts in Lehman Brothers, State Street and Bloomberg in London. She was also the head of the Institutional Business at Menacorp and the Business Manager at Fidessa, one of the largest Fintech software providers worldwide and Group CDO at Equitativa, a diversified asset management and private equity firm, focused on the Real estate sector, where she pioneered the expansion of the firm to Emerging markets.

Racha is a regular lead speaker in International financial forums including International Exchanges and regularly addresses regional strategy on Capital Markets, Equity and Real Estate on CNBC and Bloomberg.

She holds a Bsc in Mathematics from UCL, London, an MBA specializing in Finance from Imperial College, London and an Executive Education in Commercial Real Estate Analysis and Investment from MIT, Boston, USA . She speaks fluent English, Arabic and French.