AHMED EL ALFI

Founder and Chairman of Sawari Ventures, named as one of the most creative people in the world by Fast Company, Ahmed El Alfi has been an early stage/growth investor for over 30 years, translating to an extensive experience in funding and nurturing early-stage companies. In 1990, he founded Hybrid Capital Partners, a private investment partnership. Hybrid Capital has funded, helped grow and exited several successful companies. From 2010 to 2013 he founded Sawari Ventures, Flat6Labs, Nafham, and TATP. Flat6Labs is the MENA region’s leading startup accelerator. Nafham is the top Arabic online video educational platform covering the Egyptian, Saudi and Syrian public school curriculums, Nafham has given over 100 million free video lessons to students. TATP took over management of half of the American University in Cairo’s Tahrir Square campus to form The GrEEK Campus; a 25,000 square meter office park where over 130 companies work and collaborate.

In addition to Sawari Ventures’ portfolio of investments, his current portfolio includes NeuroTrainer, Pacific Toxicology, as well as Zignal Labs.

Prior to becoming an early-stage investor in 1990, he was Senior Vice President of Jefferies & Company, where he worked for 10 years. He has served on the Boards of Directors or Advisors of several corporate boards as well as multiple academic institutions.

Anta Ndiaye

Anta has been an evangelist, connector, and enabler of African entrepreneurship since 2016. She took a key role in the launch of the French Tech Cape Town in South Africa, initiated the activities of the French Tech in New York, where has built solid relationships with the American VC scene, worked in Sales in the Top tier French cybersecurity start-up CybelAngel in NYC and has most recently served as the Manager Africa of Euroquity, a Bpifrance services connecting Tech ecosystems in Europe and in Africa, where she was facilitating co-investment opportunities between African and international VCs

Anta holds a Master’s degree in Management from top 6 French Business School Audencia and a Master’s degree in Public Management from Sciences Po.

Basmat Al-Sabbah Fareed

Basmat-Al Sabbah is a Senior Investment Analyst at Sawari. Prior to working at Sawari she worked in tech startups including Smart Medical Services, a tech focused medical company and Cognitev, an AI company using machine learning to re-make marketing, where she performed roles ranging from business planning, to strategy and operations, to project management of technical teams. Prior to that she worked in the nonprofit sector at Catholic Relief Services as a Business Consultant for refugees who were starting new businesses in Egypt.
Basma graduated summa cum laude from the American University in Cairo with a bachelor’s in Business Administration.

DALIA EL MOHAMADY

Dalia ElMohamady is the CFO at Sawari Ventures. Prior to joining Sawari Ventures, Dalia worked as a Business Finance Director and deputy CFO for Swvl, where she was responsible for building and managing the Finance Business Unit, as well as starting the Investor Relations function at the company. Before that, Dalia held the position of the Regional Strategic Planning & Competitive Intelligence Manager at CEMEX Asia & MENA regions, where she led the regional unit to strategically manage five operating countries generating over $500 Million in OCF per annum, in her early career Dalia worked in both FP&A and Decision Support at Vodafone.

Dalia holds a Master of Business Administration in International Finance from the Paris ESLSCA Business School.

Farah Abd El-Gawad

Farah is Principal at Sawari. She has experience in private equity, asset management and venture capital, encompassing a range of sectors, including non-bank financial services, agribusiness, FMCG and petrochemicals. Prior to working at Sawari, she co-managed public equity, fixed income and money market funds totaling more than 2 billion Egyptian pounds at NBK Capital.

She has also worked at Tanmeya Capital Ventures, one of Egypt’s fastest growing private equity firms where she was part of the team that closed the first three transactions of the firm’s fund in less than two years totaling $12 million. Prior to that she worked at the Sawiris Foundation for Environmental Development where she took part in formulating the foundation’s overall strategy and was responsible for sourcing funding for its projects.

Farah holds a bachelor’s in Finance from the American University in Cairo.

Farah Yehia

Farah is an Investment Associate at Sawari Ventures. Prior to joining Sawari, Farah worked in different Development Financial Institutions including African Export Import Bank and European Bank for Reconstruction and Development where she honed her skills in investment analysis and operational due diligence. Additionally, she completed a private equity graduate program at Letter One Technology in London, UK where she gained in-depth insights in private equity operations.
Farah earned her MSc in Venture Capital and Private Equity with FinTech from University College London (UCL) and graduated magna cum laude from the American University in Cairo with a bachelor’s in Business Administration and a bachelor’s in Accounting.

FATIMA-ZAHRA BENNANI

Fatima began her career in Private Equity at Lazard Paris and taking on an investment and venture capital role in Pentalabbs Ventures in France. She later co-founded Moroccan fintech Emabrouk as well as an edtech platform in Morocco.

Before joining Sawari Ventures, Fatima led the launch of the 212 Founders Seed Fund and Accelerator, funded by CDG Invest in Morocco, which today is Morocco’s most active investor. Fatima was leading the investment side, achieving the first Series A and Exit in the emergent ecosystem.

Fatima-Zahra holds two masters degrees from Université Paris Dauphine and the Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM), in addition to several professional certificates.

HANY AL SONBATY

Hany Al-Sonbaty is Managing Partner of Sawari Ventures, and co-founder of Flat6Labs, the largest accelerator in the MENA region, which helps entrepreneurs launch their companies through funding, training and mentorship. His focus at Sawari centers around helping up and coming founders push the boundaries of the status quo toward creative disruption.

Hany has over 20 years experience in private equity and venture capital. Prior to co-founding Sawari Ventures, he was a Partner and Head of the Technology, Media and Telecom investments section at EFG-Hermes Private Equity, a leading private equity house in the Middle East. During this time, he founded Ideavelopers, EFG-Hermes Private Equity’s dedicated venture arm, pioneering the introduction of institutional venture capital in MENA and launching the Technology Development Fund, one of the region’s first serial TMT-focused venture capital funds. He also managed EHPE’s largest general fund, Horus III, with a total portfolio size in excess of $500 million.

Hany holds a Bachelor of Engineering degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering and a Masters of Science Degree in Communications and Signal Processing from Imperial College, London.

Ibrahim Ramadan

Ibrahim is a Partner at Sawari. Ibrahim joined the firm in 2016, at the time as the only non-partner on the team
, where he worked to raise, structure, and close Sawari’s first two institutional funds. Prior to joining Sawari, he worked as a financial consultant to a number of startups in Egypt, primarily in the tech and media sectors. He also previously worked in Ahli United Bank’s corporate division covering the telecom, petrochemicals, and construction sectors. Ibrahim started his career at the Institute of Corporate Governance, where he focused on restructuring SME’s.

Ibrahim holds a Master of Science in Macro and International Economics from Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich. He is also an avid coffee enthusiast, and a certified Barista.

JENNIFER SCHOEBERLEIN

Jennifer is Sawari Ventures’ ESG & Impact Partner. She joined the firm in 2019 and is responsible for ESG integration in the investment process, ESG risk assessment and capacity building at fund and portfolio level, as well as impact monitoring and ESG-related investor communications.

Prior to working with Sawari Ventures, her career included positions at the Egyptian Junior Business Association, Transparency International, and HUMBOLDT-VIADRINA Governance Platform, where she worked in the fields of business integrity, anti-corruption, and SME capacity building.

Jennifer studied in Hamburg/Germany and Sevilla/Spain and holds an M.Sc. in Social Sciences from the University of Hamburg.

JULIA KELLY

Julia is the ESG & Impact Officer at Sawari Ventures. She works with the ESG & Impact Partner focusing on risk assessment and impact monitoring of the fund and portfolio companies. Julia has worked in Egypt, Morocco, Oman, and Jordan, contributing to non-profit institutions, for-profit companies, and academic research projects.

Julia holds a bachelor’s degree in Middle Eastern and North African Studies from Scripps College and completed the CASA fellowship, a post-graduate Arabic scholarship for advanced non-native Arabic scholars, at the American University in Cairo.

KHALED EL TANANY

Khaled is the Head of Compliance and AML Manager at Sawari. Prior to joining Sawari, Khaled worked as a director of the internal control and head of AML at Ostoul Group for Financial Investments. He also worked for 18 years at Concord International Group for asset management as a head of the operations department, preparing the daily evaluation of assets and also supervising the implementation of the decisions of the Investment Committee. He also worked as an external control and auditor for several banks like Qatar National Bank Al Ahly-QNB, Blom Bank and Banque du Caire.

Khaled holds a license for both the Compliance and AML officer from the Egyptian Financial Regulatory Authority (FRA) and a Master’s Degree in Financial Accounting and Auditing, he also holds several professional certificates in the fields of the Compliance, AML and FATCA.

NADER MAGED

Nader is a senior investment analyst. Prior to working at Sawari, Nader worked as investment analyst at CI Capital Holding in the investment banking division, working on several buy-side and sell-side M&A and ECM transactions across various industries including real estate, financial services and consumer goods.

Nader graduated cum laude from the American University in Cairo with a bachelor’s in Business Administration.

NORAN Heikal

Noran is the General Accountant at Sawari Ventures. Prior to joining Sawari, Noran worked as an external auditor for three years in Abdul Aziz Hegazy Office, auditing for several banks, including NBK, AIB, and many joint stock companies. Additionally, she worked as an accountant at the Inter Solar Egypt Company.

Noran graduated from Ain Shams University with a bachelor’s in Accounting and completed the Certified Management Accountant (CMA) training course.

Omar Ghoneim

Omar has over 4 years of experience in the finance industry and a year in media and journalism. Prior to Sawari, Omar was an M&A Financial Advisor at Panther Associates. Before that, he was an Associate Relationship Manager at HSBC Corporate Banking for 3 years, managing a portfolio of 30+ international firms active in various industries such as Oil and Gas, Contracting, F&B, and Retail.

Omar holds a bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of Manchester.

WAEL AMIN

Wael became an entrepreneur at an early age founding his first company while still in college. After graduating at the age of 18, Wael Co-Founded ITWorx, and led its growth over a period of 20 years from start-up to one of the largest and most influential IT companies in the Middle East. Through its history, ITWorx has created more than 5000 jobs, expanded to 12 countries across 4 continents and won countless industry accolades. During his tenure at ITWorx, the company acquired Egyptian startup Otlob.com incubating it to become the largest e-commerce property in the Middle East before eventually selling it, it has also successfully incubated and spun off a number of successful startups, in Laserstorm, NetCelera, and ITWorx Education. Having produced more than 200 entrepreneurs responsible for 100+ Egyptian technology start-ups, ITWorx is generally considered the most impactful company in the Egypt IT ecosystem.

Wael holds a B.Sc. in Computer Science (1993) and an MBA (2004) from the American University in Cairo (“AUC”). He is a frequent lecturer on the transformational impact of technology and a guest lecturer at the AUC MBA program. He is fluent in English, French, Spanish and Arabic.