2025 Certified Trade Mission to

Dubai, UAE

April 28-29, 2025

Schedule a Call

Agenda

Monday, April 28, 2025

Arrival in Dubai

3:00 PM Check in at the Shangri- La Hotel,DIFC

6:30 PM Reception with the US Embassy, Shangri-La Hotel, Dubai

Tuesday, April 29, 2025

9:00 AM - 10:00 AM Registration & Buffet Networking Breakfast with LP's

10:00 AM - 2:00 PM Members of the US delegation will meet in one on one meetings with investment professionals from UAE’s institutional investors and family offices

Acommodations

HotelShangri -La Hotel DIFC,Dubai Sheikh Zayed Rd Near Financial Metro Station

Check In:Monday, April 28, 2025

Check Out:Tuesday, April 29, 2025

Phone:+971 4 343 8888

From the time of payment up to six weeks prior to the trade mission: You are eligible for a 50% refund of the payment amount if you cancel your participation during this period. From six weeks prior to the trade mission: There will be no refund available if you cancel your participation during this period.

EVENT CO-CHAIR(S)

Abbas Hashmi

Abbas Hashmi

Principal, Saudi Family Holdings | Program Leader, Global Family Enterprise Program, Columbia Business School | Ex-Goldman Sachs & AIG

Abbas Hashmi is the Principal of Saudi Family Holdings, a Single Family Office based in New York and Riyadh, focused on strategic investments and impactful ventures. He bridges opportunities between U.S.-based private investors and the GCC region, leveraging his deep expertise in capital introductions and strategic growth.

At Columbia Business School, Abbas serves as the Program Leader for the Global Family Enterprise Program, empowering family enterprise leaders with strategic mindsets, skills, and connections to drive sustainable progress. His role involves guiding participants through transformative learning experiences, drawing on his extensive global network and industry insights.

With over two decades of global experience, Abbas specializes in capital formation, investor relations, and family office dynamics. He is a sought-after speaker and moderator at premier events including LEAP, Money 20/20, and Cityscape Global, where he addresses capital raising strategies, financial innovation, and global wealth trends.

Abbas has a distinguished background, having previously worked at Goldman Sachs and AIG, leading strategic initiatives and global business development. He also co-chairs trade missions to the Middle East under the U.S. Department of Commerce, fostering cross-border investments and economic collaborations.

He holds an MBA in International Business and is actively involved in moderating and delivering keynotes on family office dynamics, capital formation, and financial innovation globally.
Read Bio
Matthew Francis

Matthew Francis

Chief Strategy & Investment Officer at Vault Investments

Matthew is a seasoned executive with over 20 years experience in the banking, technology, and capital raising industries. He spent 11 years at Bank of America, UBS, and Morgan Stanley in California, providing financial guidance and investments for institutions and senior executives in Silicon Valley. He worked at Oracle as an enterprise sales leader covering the Pacific Northwest (USA). Most recently, Matthew has successfully helped some of the largest and most respected U.S. based private equity fund managers secure capital from sovereign wealth funds, investment firms, and family offices in the GCC. Matthew is currently the Chief Strategy & Investment Officer for Vault Investments, a private family office based in Dubai UAE. He's also an Advisor to a UAE/USA based startup, Ruya Genomics.
Read Bio
Gagan Ganapathy

Gagan Ganapathy

Founder & Head at Lawyers Transcontinental

Gagan advises clients on multiple practice areas including private international laws, foreign investment laws, commercial laws, infrastructure laws, technology laws, civil, criminal, construction, real property, intellectual property laws, matters of constitutional and public importance at Lawyers Transcontinental, an International and Indian law practice headquartered out of Bangalore with operations spread across India and different continents.

Gagan has dealt with matters involving clients and client interests from/in more than 30 countries and across 5 continents: Asia, America, Europe, Africa and Australia in addition to every region across the length and breadth of the Indian Sub Continent. Gagan works with a team of advisors from about 25 countries and across every single state of India.

Amongst other things, Gagan in his experience as a lawyer spread over two decades, a distinguished record of working on multiple Cross border as well as domestic M and A transactions in addition to facilitating multiple foreign Investments into and from India.

Prior to founding Lawyers Transcontinental, Gagan in his earlier experience worked with the then leading Indian International, Corporate,Technology law firms in addition to a designated Senior Advocates practice where he gained experience in other traditional areas of law as it was always his ambition to found an International and Indian Law practice with multiple practice areas which he eventually did with Lawyers Transcontinental.

Gagan is an alumnus of the prestigious National Law School India University, Bangalore where he graduated with a Masters in Business Laws. Gagan also is an alumnus of the University of Newcastle Upon Tyne, England where he graduated with a Masters in International Trade Laws with merit. Gagan also graduated with a Bachelors in Academic Laws and Bachelor of Laws from MSRCL, Bangalore University.

Gagan is enrolled as an Advocate with the Bar Council of India. Gagan is proficient in English, Kannada, Hindi, Kodava (Coorg) and understands Tamil.
Read Bio
Shrikant Saboo

Shrikant Saboo

CBO & President at SABKO INDUSTRIES GROUP INDIA & UAE

Mr. Shrikant Saboo, a bright scholar secured position among top 0.1% of the graduation class in AISSCE 1996 and Graduated “Magna Cum Lauda” from the Kelly School of Business USA.

Upon Graduation Mr. Saboo, was drafted by a fortune 500 company. He gained practical training and in the year 2001 returned to India, since he believed the new millennium rightfully belongs to India.

Upon return, he chose Udaipur Rajasthan as his work place and scaled up the operations of SABKO INDUSTRIES GROUP, established by father & World renowned Technocrat MR. ML SABOO. In the capacity Mr. Shrikant Saboo has attended more than 45 Industry Conferences and was a part of the BRICS summit 2012 in Durban and India Africa Conclave 2014 in Delhi.

Mr Saboo is an avid traveler and has travelled to 85+ countries in 6 continents.

Mr. Shrikant Saboo is credited with the several PROFESSIONAL ACHIEVEMENTS in Engineering Exports to Africa, Middle East, and South East Asia.

SABKO INDUSTRIES GROUP has earned the following awards under his leadership 1. International Award for Best Performance by UK trade body
2. Udhyog Ratna Award
3. Best Customer-Punjab National Bank

Mr. Shrikant Saboo is associated in various capacities with following companies

• SABKO FZ LLC, UAE (President & CBO)
• SABKO ENGINEERING INDUSTRIES PVT LTD INDIA (Director)
• ZITHAS TECHNOLOGIES PVT LTD (President & CBO)
• VINNI CHEMICALS PRIVATE LIMITED (CBO)

Social Engagements:

• Past Regional Chairman for Round Table International covering 18 countries of Africa, Middle East and Indian Ocean Countries
• Past Member: Rotary Club Udaipur-Heritage
• Life Member: Jaisal Club Ltd, Jaisalmer
• Life Member: Mortar Board & Greek Honor Societies
• Past Advisor: Samvedna Charitable Trust: Udaipur (NGO)

AWARDS & RECOGNITIONS

• KELLY ALUMNI STAR
• PRESIDENT ROUND TABLE ARABIAN GULF 2018
• TABLER OF THE YEAR 2019
• AMI REGION CHAIRMAN FOR ROUND TABLE INTERNATIONAL 2020

Educational Background

• BSC in Business with major in Finance, Business Process Management, operations Management, Minor in Information Technology, from Kellly School of Business USA
• 18 CPE Credits : Activity Based Costing and Management from Chicago USA
• Short Term Entrepreneurship Course from IIM Ahmedabad
Read Bio
Lixia Zhu

Lixia Zhu

Principal at 76Columbus Family Investments

Principal, 76Columbus | Head of MENA, Asian Family Legacy Foundation | Board Member, Columbia Alumni Association UAE | Guest Lecturer, HKUST | Ex-JPMorgan & Fiserv

Lixia Zhu is the Principal of 76Columbus, a Single Family Office based in New York and Dubai, specializing in technology and alternative investments. She also leads MENA operations for the Asian Family Legacy Foundation, a Hong Kong-based nonprofit that connects 450+ next-gen family leaders across Asia and globally.

Lixia is a board member of the Columbia Alumni Association UAE and a guest lecturer in the Family Office Course at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology (HKUST). With nearly two decades of global experience spanning East and West, she specializes in family business and office dynamics, alternative asset allocation, and investor relations.

A recognized thought leader, Lixia speaks at premier family office and alternative investment conferences, including UAE Wealth Summit, Apex Investor Summit Abu Dhabi, SuperReturn Dubai & Riyadh, and Dubai AI & Web3.

Before transitioning into the investment world, Lixia had a distinguished career in banking and fintech, holding senior executive roles at JPMorgan Chase and Fiserv. She is also an angel investor and an Advisor-in-Residence at Columbia University’s NYC Venture Lab.

Lixia founded her own AI and Web3 fintech company while completing her Executive MBA at Columbia Business School and London Business School. She also holds an M.S. in Information Technology from the University of Florida.
Read Bio
Manav Kumar

Manav Kumar

President at Dynamic Drilling

Manav Kumar is President of Dynamic Drilling. Dynamic Group owns and operates offshore drilling rigs which are operating for ONGC, National Oil Company of India and expanding to work with other NOC’s like ADNOC, Saudi Aramco, Petronas etc.

Having over 25 years of experience in various facets of business, apart from Oilfield Services he serves as Board Member in other Dynamic Group businesses spanning from Mining Projects in Africa, Solar Projects, Power Transmission etc. He has been instrumental in growing Dynamic's business internationally including Strategic JV's with global corporations (listed in NYSE, SGX) and has raised over USD 800 Million for various projects until now. The group has offices in India, Singapore, UAE, Mauritius and various countries in Africa.

He is the youngest ExCom Member of International Association of Drilling Contractors (IADC), USA and has also served as the youngest Chairman for the South East Asia Region for year 2015-2017. He is a member of Young President Organization (YPO) Gurgaon, Singapore and Emirates Chapter (UAE) and has served on Singapore Chapter’s Board.

An avid traveler and speaker on Oil & Gas industry internationally. In 2016 he was recognized by the Singapore India Chamber of Commerce and Industry (SICCI) with the award of ‘Singapore Indian Business leader, 2016’.

Presently pursuing Owner/President Management Program (OPM 64) from Harvard Business School, he holds a Masters in Management Degree from Lancaster University, UK and was awarded “Outstanding Alumni Award” by the University in year 2015.
Read Bio

U.S. DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE

Brian N. Beams

Brian N. Beams

Director, Global Financial Services Team Senior International Trade Specialist U.S. Commercial Service

Peter Sexton

Peter Sexton

Deputy Director, Global Financial Services Team U.S. Commercial Service

Christelle Rezk

Christelle Rezk

Commercial Specialist, U.S. Consulate General Dubai

Bruce Ellsworth

Bruce Ellsworth

Foreign Commercial Service Officer, International Trade Administration U.S. Department of Commerce

FRED AZIZ

FRED AZIZ

PRINCIPAL COMMERCIAL OFFICER

Testimonial

“I thought the Trade Mission was one of the most unique fundraising assets I’ve ever seen. The ability to have 50+ warm leads provided over the course of 1 day is phenomenal. It would have been impossible for our fund to have done anything like this ourselves and I doubt any financial service organizations could have provided a stronger group. I would highly recommend the Trade Mission, not just because of the quantity of potential investors but the quality of investors.”

– Maxx Bricklin, Principal, Bold Capital Partners, LP

U.S. Department of Commerce Certified Trade Mission:

Bespoke Introductions to Leading U.S. Alternative Asset Fund Managers

This Trade Mission is arranged exclusively for investors seeking to meet with leading U.S. fund managers.

Schedule a Call