CFI.co Meets the Co-Founding Partner and MD of Ioannides Demetriou LLC: Pambos Ioannides

Pambos Ioannides is a co-founding partner and managing director of Ioannides Demetriou LLC. Mr Ioannides has wide experience in all fields of commercial law, offering his expertise to major corporate clients, both local and international. He acts as legal advisor to semi-governmental organisations, banks, the Cyprus Stock Exchange, and construction and engineering companies. Mr Ioannides has also assisted insurance, oil, and shipping companies in addition to businesses in the hospitality sector, trading houses, amongst others.

Mr Ioannides acts as leading counsel in major local and international commercial transactions, as well as in major court and arbitration cases. He also acts as an arbitrator in international and local disputes. Furthermore, he advises international corporations and investors in the use of Cyprus corporate vehicles and investment opportunities.

Mr Ioannides’ expertise includes the drafting of a wide range of documents, e.g. statutory instruments pertaining to the structuring, administration, and operation of semi-governmental organisations such as the Cyprus Stock Exchange, the Cyprus Agricultural Payments Organisation, the Cyprus Ports Authority, and the Central Bank of Cyprus. He is also recognized for his expertise in drawing up contract documentation in international transactions; tender and contract documents and studies for major infrastructure projects, including, inter alia, the ports and airports of Cyprus, tourist and development projects, shopping centres; and mergers and takeovers of banking, insurance, tourism, and other businesses. Mr Ioannides boasts considerable experience in the design and execution of the legal underpinnings of joint ventures at national and cross-border levels; syndicated loans and other banking, financing, and securities documentation; listings on the stock exchange; and assorted corporate documentation.

Mr Ioannides is a member of the board of directors of public and private companies. He is also the author of a number of publications on Cyprus corporate and business law, such as Cyprus Corporate and Trust Law, Partnership Law of Cyprus, Directors Liabilities in Respect of Prospectus, and Cyprus Enterprises. He has given many lectures in seminars, both in Cyprus and abroad, on public law and corporate and business law. He is an examiner for the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (corporate and business law).


CFI.co Meets the Governor of the Central Bank of Mauritius: Rameswurlall Basant Roi

At the helm of Bank of Mauritius, winner of CFI.co’s 2017 Best Central Bank Governance Indian Ocean Award, Rameswurlall Basant Roi is the one of the country’s most seasoned central bankers. Mr Basant Roi (GCSK – Grand Commander of the Order of the Star and Key of the Indian Ocean) was appointed governor of the central bank of Mauritius for a second mandate with effect from 30 December 2014. He served in the same position for eight years from November 1998 to December 2006.

Governor Basant Roi has spent more than three decades in the central banking arena. He is currently chairman of the board of directors of the central bank and of its Monetary Policy Committee. He is also a member of the Financial Stability Committee chaired by the Minister of Finance and Economic Development.

Mr Basant Roi joined the Research Department of Bank of Mauritius as research officer in 1976 and was appointed assistant director of the department in 1984. He became the department’s director in 1987. Since the mid-1980s Mr Basant Roi has been closely associated with the development of the financial sector of Mauritius which has evolved into one of the country’s most important economic pillars.

He was directly involved with the liberalisation of Mauritius’ financial industry and with the establishment of the offshore banking sector. His relations with many international institutions – including the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the Bank for International Settlements – as well as with players from various sectors of the domestic economy throughout his career has earned Mr Basant Roi wide-ranging experience and international recognition. In 2004, he was awarded the highest distinction of the Republic of Mauritius – the GCSK – for his contribution to the financial services industry of the country.

In January 2017, Governor Basant Roi was elected the 2017 Central Bank Governor of the Year for Africa by The Banker magazine. In February 2017, he was presented with the Personality of the Year Award 2016 (Finance) by the UK-based African Leadership Magazine. Three months later, Mr Basant Roi received the Central Bank Governor of the Year Award by the African Banker magazine endorsed by the African Development Bank Group. On 20 July 2017, the Bank of Mauritius won the Best Central Bank Governance Indian Ocean 2017 Award conferred by Capital Finance International (CFI.co), underlining the governor’s focus on strengthening and modernising the banking industry.

Under the stewardship of Governor Basant Roi the Bank of Mauritius is propelling the banking and financial sector to higher levels. The relentless endeavours to reinforce Mauritius’ competitiveness and attractiveness as an international financial centre continues to draw the spotlight on the Bank of Mauritius.

One of the governor’s strategic decisions in early 2015 was to revamp the organisational structure of the Bank of Mauritius in order to enhance its functional and operational efficiency. This strategic move decisively set the base for effective execution of policy decisions and projects. The awards conferred upon the governor and the Bank of Mauritius confirm, as Governor Basant Roi has put it: “The diligence and commitment with which all stakeholders within the Bank of Mauritius, from the board directors to the newest recruit, have been discharging their responsibilities to fulfil the mandates of the central bank. The CFI.co award also translates the efficacy of the policies of the Bank of Mauritius and the quality of the dialogue it has established with all its stakeholders.”


CFI.co Meets the VP of Banco de Corrientes: Alejandro Enrique Abraham

Alejandro Enrique Abraham was born in Corrientes on October 13, 1951, to Alexander Abraham and Maria Raisa Jasid. Together with his parents and his three brothers, he formed a family that progressed in the region thanks to the constant efforts of each of them.

The example set by his father left its mark. It was his father who founded one of the first insurance companies in the area. An experienced entrepreneur, he became vice president of the historic Bank of Commerce.

Mr Abraham was raised in a family with good values and grew up surrounded by examples of effort, sacrifice, and an irrepressible drive to progress. These early influences shaped Mr Abraham’s personal and professional life.

It was at that time that he understood the importance of private commercial activity – the engine that drives employment, energises society, and helps it develop. Mr Abraham married Graciela del Carmen Zaimakis and the couple were blessed with five children – Alejandro, María Raisa, Victoria, Marcos, and Juan Francisco. Family values, firmly rooted and handed down the generations, constitute a central pillar of their lives.

Mr Abraham completed high school in 1968 in Argentina. A year later, now in the United States on the AFS exchange programme, he received another high school degree. He had the opportunity to pursue an academic career and graduated as a lawyer at the prestigious National University of the Northeast, the foremost academic institution of northern Argentina.

Mr Abraham complemented his academic studies at the emblematic Harvard University in Boston with numerous specialist courses such as negotiation, business administration, and corporate management. He had the opportunity to occupy a number of posts in the public sector but dedicated most of his life to private business activity. During his career he has initiated and developed important businesses in different areas.
Recognised for producing excellent results as a manager, Mr Abraham was asked by the shareholders of Bank of Corrientes to shape and lead the recovery process of the institution in 2009. The invitation involved a huge challenge. To meet that challenge, Mr Abraham assembled an extraordinary management team that included successful entrepreneurs and recognised experts in various areas. This allowed for different points of view which in turn facilitated the corporate recovery of the bank.

His experiences in both the public and private sector have allowed Mr Abraham to adapt quickly to changing situations and environments. He believes in building bridges between the government and the private sector. Much of what has been accomplished since Mr Abraham’s arrival at the bank may be ascribed to his understanding of permanently regenerating markets and his innovative approach to development – one that involves not just the company but the surrounding society as well and leverages the strength of private initiative.


CFI.co Meets the CEO of Minerva Foods: Fernando Galletti de Queiroz

Chief executive officer of Minerva Foods since 2007, Fernando Galletti de Queiroz joined the business in 1992 serving as its chief commercial officer and in a number of other key positions. Before joining the company, he worked at Cargill Agrícola and Cotia Trading. Mr Galleti holds a Bachelor's degree in Business Administration from the Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo of that Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV). He details his management styles and views on sustainability.

“Minerva Foods' business is strategically driven, based on three pillars: focus, discipline, and consistency. This concept allows the company to achieve positive results over the years, with operational and financial indicators that attest to the increasing efficiency of operations. In the global market, for example, we recently consolidated our global structures and our international offices, with greater commercial focus and started to generate more volume of third-party products, through their own trading in Uruguay and Australia, as well as working to develop efficient distribution channels.”

“In the international meat market, our business strategy also allows the company to seize opportunities, such as the slowdown in Australian exports, which help to expand South America's access to new markets – an effect that should contribute to new trade openings by South American countries and increase the region's participation in the global market.”

How do ESG parameters and sustainability principles affect the way your processing plants are run?
“Sustainability and supply chain management are core strategies for Minerva Foods, especially when dealing with cattle raising in sensible biomes. Minerva Foods is a signatory on public commitments to develop sustainable livestock farming, adopting strict criteria from the start to the end of the production chain, starting with the purchase of cattle. All acquisitions are only made after checking the cattle's origin, in compliance with the requirements stipulated under the social, environmental and labour aspects.”

“Therefore, Minerva products are associated neither with child/forced labour practices and embargoed areas nor with illegally deforested areas in the Amazon biome and encroachment on indigenous lands, conservations units, and environmental protection areas in Brazil.”

“Recently, Minerva is pioneering geospatial monitoring on the Chaco biome, for its operations in Paraguay. Guided by International Finance Corporation performance standards, Minerva started classifying its suppliers in the Chaco Region according to environmental criteria.”

“Moreover, all company operations – processing, packaging, storage, distribution, publicity, product labelling, and food safety standards – are subject to extensive regulation and supervision by local and foreign authorities. Environmental KPIs are also constantly monitored seeking better usage performance on critical industrial supplies, such as water.

What are the mid to long-term challenges faced by your business?
“The main challenge of our business is to meet the demands of the global population by providing high quality food. In the beef market, the challenge is to provide high quality animal protein to people around the world, produced in a sustainable way and with respect to the demands of consumers in terms of taste and food safety.”
“This challenge is further evidenced by population growth and increasing purchasing power of people in various regions of the world, which increases the demand for beef compared to other animal proteins. And the Minerva is already prepared for this scenario by the adoption of a strategy of geographical diversification of production in South America, a region that has many natural advantages to produce agricultural commodities and that has been growing in terms of production and efficiency, with the potential to grow even more.”

What is the single most important requirement to become a global business?
“An important requirement to act globally is the ability to meet the demands of the entire supply chain. In the beef market, supply chain involves important steps, ranging from the purchase to attend market requirements, to supplying high quality, sustainably produced and food-safe beef to consumers in more than one hundred countries. In all these stages, the company must be able to meet the demands of all its stakeholders with the maximum operational and commercial efficiencies.”


CFI.co Meets the Management Team: Fideicomiso Hipotecario

Fideicomiso Hipotecario – FHipo for short – is a mortgage REIT created for the sole purpose of acquiring, originating, co-participating, servicing, and managing mortgage loan portfolios in Mexico. FHipo was formed on late 2014 by Concentradora Hipotecaria (CH), advisor and manager of this special and most innovative REIT in the country.

FHipo, after three years of operation, continues to be the first vehicle that allows the general public to invest in residential mortgage portfolios in Mexico, whilst at the same time, contributing to the development of the housing sector and providing liquid resources for the two biggest mortgage originators in Mexico – Infonavit and Fovissste whose social mandate is driving change in their borrowers’ life.

As of today, FHipo is the only mortgage REIT (MREIT) listed on the Mexican Stock Exchange (BMV). FHipo initiated its operations with the main objective of creating a unique opportunity for national and international investors to invest in mortgage portfolios, expanding their investment horizon and, at the same time, creating an attractive dividend play based on the performance of payroll deducted mortgages that represent an optimal risk reward opportunity.

FHipo has delivered on all goals and objectives established since its IPO: i) equity deployment, having invested 100% of the resources attained through its equity issuance in less than a year, ii) mortgage diversification, managing to participate in three mortgage origination programs through Infonavit and Fovissste, iii) profitability, creating the highest dividend play in the local industry, iv) credit quality, maintaining a low and stable non-current portfolio, and v) an efficient leverage strategy, having achieved leverage financing through different types of leverage structures, such as securitisations, short term bonds, warehousing line facilities, and the first covered bond issued within the local market, showing the management’s capacity to innovate and create new asset classes in the Mexican market.

FHipo has been fully operational for approximately three years. During this time, FHipo has achieved significant growth, its portfolio worth more than MXN $25,000m (approx. $1,5bn), which translates into more than 80,000 loans granted throughout the entire country.

As a result of FHipo’s success and achievements, institutional investors through the capital markets continue to reward FHipo, by demanding its bond issuances at competitive rates and healthy conditions, facilitating FHipo’s funding capabilities.

This success is mostly owed to FHipo’s experienced and sophisticated team. FHipo continues to thrive with the same young and entrepreneurial management. The same executives that started this project in 2014 – a team characterised by diversity, knowledge, and experience – continue to direct such efforts.

FHipo’s management team, which has consolidated its business plan within a couple of years of its IPO, continues to demonstrate its ability and professionalism within the Mexican mortgage industry. A team lead by Daniel Braatz (33) and Ignacio Gutierrez (29), the youngest CEO and CFO in the Mexican Stock Exchange, combined with Jesus Gomez, FHipo’s COO, considered one of the most experienced and sophisticated mortgage bankers, jointly have created a business that is both profitable and has a pronounced social element.

With the resources obtained through the capital markets, FHipo has created greater competitiveness within the industry and contributed to the improvement of terms and conditions for the entire mortgage industry. The firm allows home buyers, regularly unattended by commercial banks, to access the housing sector at significantly lower interest rates through origination programmes with Infonavit and Fovissste. The firm participates in housing projects that directly impact the quality of life of Mexican workers, by offering borrowers increased security and proximity to job opportunities, reducing daily commutes, thus increasing the quality of life of its borrowers and providing one of the most important assets for a family, its house.

Furthermore, it is important to comprehend that Mexican pension funds (AFORES) are FHipo’s main investors, holding the largest portion of its outstanding shares. FHipo, as a public vehicle and 100% floated in the capital market, contributes to the generation of value for both Mexican savers and workers: i) Mexican workers, through the AFOREs participate in FHipo; ii) FHipo then provides residential mortgage loans to Mexican formal workers through Infonavit and Fovissste; iii) as a result, workers have greater opportunities and facilities to acquire a house, and finally; iv) FHipo distributes its profits, benefiting investors (AFORES), which represent the workers savings. i


CFI.co Meets the CEO of GVK Biosciences: Manni Kantipudi

Manni Kantipudi has been leading GVK Biosciences for the last 10 years, one of the largest India-based discovery, development & manufacturing solutions provider to the biopharma industry. With over a quarter century worth of experience in life sciences and the broader technology sector, Mr Kantipudi brings an innate sense of innovation, customer focus, and discipline to the management of the company.

Mr Kantipudi has been a member of the Young Professional Organization (YPO), a global platform for chief executives to engage, learn, and grow for the last fifteen years. The YPO has more than 24,000 members in over 130 countries. Mr Kantipudi has served the YPO in various local and regional roles and was the chairperson of the organisation’s Hyderabad Chapter in 2016 and 2017. For the last decade, he has also been a member of the Confederation of Indian Industries (CII), the country’s premier trade and industry association.

Journey to GVK Biosciences

Manni pursued a bachelor’s degree in Computer Engineering at the University of Mumbai and a master’s degree in Computer Science at Arizona State University. He chose to drop-out of his PhD programme in Artificial Intelligence to deliver real-world value in the industry. Mr Kantipudi started his professional life at Intel – a dream job for every computer science graduate keen to work with a fast growing and ground breaking company.

In his sixteen years at Intel, Manni handled senior management roles in manufacturing, sales and marketing, and product development, amongst others. Intel employees jokingly claim to have blue blood running through their veins in reference to their allegiance to the company’s blue logo. Working on artificial intelligence software for the manufacturing plants in the early 1990s taught him to work in a highly structured environment. The work also highlighted the importance of systems and processes for the scaling of business.

Mr Kantipudi moved to sales and marketing. At the time, the department was rather unstructured and struggling to meet customer needs in the novel internet environment. He learned the value of maintaining customer focus and the need to adapt to new technologies that were emerging thick and fast in late 1990s.

Mr Kantipudi visited India to look for and hire bright engineers. Manoeuvring the Indian corporate, political, and social world proved a tough challenge. Even so, he set up the India Intel R&D Center and scaled the facility up to around one thousand employees in three years’ time. He also took on the responsibility for running Intel’s e-business for the Asia-Pacific Region, including Japan, and was CIO of Intel for the region. In these roles, Mr Kantipudi managed employees in nine countries and learned to work with various teams of different sizes, priorities, cultures, and backgrounds. He recognises the importance of building trust, working with integrity, and understanding that people around the world have a common value system.

Mr Kantipudi moved back to the US to lead a core product development team for Intel dedicated to delivering Wi-Fi solutions. With professionals collaborating across four countries and six sites, the team delivered the software for the highly-successful line of Centrino network adapters. Manni learned the importance of managing teams globally, staying focussed on delivering great products to the market.

Starting as a software engineer working on AI for manufacturing processes, he progressed to become director of the Intel India Development Center, director of e-business for the APAC Region, and software director for the wireless network division. Mr Kantipudi managed large teams, profit and loss accounts, sales and marketing, and software development with finesse and panache. His key findings include building scale, the importance of systems and processes, the management of change, learning on the job, and building teams – all guiding principles that drive his current work at GVK Biosciences.

A Decade at GVK Biosciences

In 2006, Mr Kantipudi decided to return to India, encouraged to do so by his father, a senior career bureaucrat with patriotic fervour.

GVK Biosciences is the brainchild of DS Brar, a former managing director of Ranbaxy (India’s largest pharmaceutical company), and Sanjay Reddy of GVK Group (a fast-growing infrastructure company) who shared a dream of creating a $1 billion firm in life sciences and tapped Mr Kantipudi to achieve this goal. Joining GVK Biosciences as President in 2007, his immediate tasks were to design systems and processes, fix deliveries, win customers, and create a new business culture at the company.

Over the past ten years including five as CEO, Manni has been instrumental in steering the company into new business verticals and establishing a strong work ethic.

The journey has had its share of opportunities and challenges but that didn’t sway Mr Kantipudi’s in his steely resolve to stay on course to building the $1 billion life sciences company. Headquartered in Hyderabad, GVK Biosciences employs over 2,500 people engaged in drug discovery, development, and manufacturing in the US, Europe, and the APAC Region.

GVK Biosciences now has established practices, a strong leadership team, and completed two acquisitions in order to build scale and expand the company’s services in the life sciences sector. With around 2000 scientists including over 200 PhDs, Manni leverages India's R&D strengths to partner with customers to bring their products to market faster. “Accelerating Research”, the company’s tagline, definitely stands out while his quest for ensuring “Safety & Compliance Always” and maintaining a “Customer First” approach are now part of the company’s DNA.

A fitness enthusiast and avid traveller, Mr Kantipudi tries to visit the gym every day for a workout. He has travelled to over seventy countries. He is also a passionate dog owner who de-stresses by playing with his animals after a long day at work. Mr Kantipudi is a manager who loves to lead from the frontline. After ten years, he continues the quest of building GVK Biosciences into a $1 billion life sciences company.


CFI.co Meets the CEO of UMG: Kiwi Aliwarga

That is what Kiwi Aliwarga was taking into consideration during the early stages of UMG – founded in 1998. He struggled with limited capital in a country still closed to investments. Kiwi Aliwarga and cofounder Marlar Win took the initiative to open up a distribution company for spare parts of heavy machinery and power generators.

“We were not expecting UMG to stand out when we started the company; we just wanted to establish a presence in Myanmar. We neither had any business plans to be successful. We made the plan along the way when the opportunity arose,” says Kiwi.

UMG has today become one of Myanmar’s leading companies with nine different business units: distribution, education, media and leisure, financial services, food and beverages, property and infrastructure development, resources and mining, health care, and information and communication technology.

Kiwi Aliwarga, CEO of UMG, was born in Jakarta, Indonesia. He received his education as an industrial engineer at the Institute of Technology of Indonesia and holds a master degree in civil engineering from the Asia Institute of Technology in Thailand. Now, he is pursuing his doctorate at Gadjamada University, Indonesia, in agriculture. He began his career in the business development division of one of Indonesia’s largest trading companies – Astra International.

When Kiwi and Marlar started UMG in 1998, Myanmar was experiencing the effects of Asia’s financial crisis: “At that time, Myanmar was facing the crisis’ impact. Fortunately we arrived at the right time as we could build trust amongst our customers and partners. We were growing fast and soon became the preferred choice of our Myanmar machinery partners. We obtained a market share in excess of 50%. However, the ups and downs of the machinery business made us realise that we needed to stabilise our business by expanding overseas or investing in other businesses.”

Now, the CEO is assisted by seven board members for the day-to-day running of the business: Daw Thet Nwe (CEO assistant), Daw Mar Mar Kyi Maung (CFO and CTO), Putri Yanthi (Director of Food and Beverage and Leisure), Raymond G Wolff (Director of Retail Distribution and Media), Isshiki Hiroaki (Director of Capital Goods), U Thien Naing (Director of Mining and Construction), and U Aye Min Htoon (Director of Corporate Human Learning and Education).

When entering a new line of business, UMG always takes into consideration market conditions and behaviour, the advancement of technology, emerging market trends, and current resources. Kiwi Aliwarga: “We do not know exactly what UMG will become twenty to thirty years from now as many new technologies will arise that can change peoples’ behaviour and affect the way we conduct business. However, we have full confidence in UMG’s resilience and longevity. The company will remain true to its mission of encouraging people to be their best for the betterment of society and the nation.”


CFI.co Meets the Director General of National Savings, Pakistan: Zafar Masud

Zafar Masud, director general of Pakistan’s Central Directorate of National Savings, is a career banker and finance expert who served in top positions at major international banks in both Pakistan and abroad. Mr Masud has established a solid track record in corporate banking with an emphasis on cash management and investment banking. He has a keen interest in raising capital for sustainable development via innovative instruments such as sukuks. He initiated and coordinated the launch of two listed sukuks in Pakistan. One of these sukuks made history as the first ever private sector triple A rated sukuk placed in the country. The sukuk aims to encourage non-traditional investors to enter the market.

Mr Masud has worked extensively with multilateral institutions of large investors. He also boasts significant experience in working directly with governments and state entities. This allows Mr Masud to appreciate and navigate the complexities of large governmental organisations and find solutions that fit seamlessly with their particular needs.
Mr Masud was a founding partner of Burj Capital, a firm specialised in Shariah-compliant financing and corporate restructuring. As a regional managing director of Barclays Bank, he was responsible for operations in Southern Africa. In that role, Mr Masud provided leadership to an organisation with around 4,000 employees and a balance sheet in excess of $3bn. Whilst in Southern Africa, Mr Masud converted the standard commercial bank he managed into one of the region’s leading consumer and investment banks. He upped the bank’s performance significantly by focusing on corporate and treasury management – improving the business’ ratings in the process.

Prior to being sent to Africa, Mr Masud was employed by Dubai Islamic Bank – a globally recognised pioneer in Shariah-compliant financial services.

Currently, Mr Masud helps the Pakistan government attract foreign investors to the country. He was instrumental in securing a number of large deals such as $375m for a large port expansion project, $150m for a palm oil processing facility, and $100m for upgrades in the financial sector. Mr Masud has helped a number of global companies establish a presence in the country such as a FMCG corporation and a leading cosmetics company.

At Citibank, Mr Masud had a seat on the country management committee and was entrusted with handling the bank’s government and public sector business. Between 1999 and 2005, he was involved in a number of large deals such as the placement of the government’s first-ever sukuk for $600m. He also brokered a $350m deal between the US EXIM Bank and Pakistan International Airlines (PIA).

Between 2013 and 2016, Mr Masud sat on the board of directors of the State Bank of Pakistan. He also served on the Constitutional Independent Monetary Policy Committee. Additionally, Mr Masud is an active member of the board of directors of Oil and Gas Development Company where he leads the risk management sub-committee.


Lucy Worsley: Bringing the Past to Life

Books are the carriers of civilisation. Without them, history is silent, literature dumb, and science crippled. That certainty has changed, quite a bit, since US historian and author Barbara Tuchman (1912-1989) celebrated books as vessels of – and portals to – knowledge. Perhaps more fleeting in nature, and lacking depth, television has nibbled away at, if not supplanted, the book’s dominance in the dissemination of history.

Sometime in the mid-1990s, large media conglomerates discovered a market for popular history – one they had largely ignored up to then. Seemingly overnight, multiple television channels popped up to explore past worlds. Not to be left behind, publishers churned out new magazines charting humanity’s progress throughout the ages.

Academia, instead of rejoicing in the interest for their arcane pursuits, mostly deplored the invasion of its ivory towers by the curious masses which tended to dispense with nuance and clamoured for the clarity offered by primary colours. Aghast at the demand for superficiality, the dons who diligently and jealously keep watch over academic propriety, accuse popular historians of dumbing down past events, steamrolling over dissenting viewpoints, and adorning the wheels of progress with unbecoming bells and whistles to create extravaganzas that never quite were.

Thus it was that Lucy Worsley (43), chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces and armed with impeccable Oxford credentials, got caught in the crossfire when she was invited to produce and present popular history programmes for the BBC. Considered by some to single-handedly sustain the BBC Four channel, Ms Worsley revels in dusting off history to unlock the past to millions of viewers. Quirky, puckish, and often downright funny, Lucy Worsley’s trademark style has brought history mainstream and boosted the usually rather dismal ratings of the highbrow channel.

Ms Worsley’s popularity is now such that her take on the six wives of Henry VIII debuted on the flagship BBC One network in December 2016. Fellow historian David Starkey is having none of it and wondered – out loud – why his female colleagues appearing on television are “usually quite pretty”. However, Mr Starkey, a constitutional historian and known for an acerbic tongue that earned him the sobriquet “rudest man in Britain”, may have been munching sour grapes. His own television series on the charismatic Tudor king and his multiple wives, broadcast in 2001, proved slightly less memorable.

A few historians lost it altogether with the notoriously subversive Terry Deary of Horrible Histories fame calling Ms Worsley spiteful, criticising her “posh little voice and play-acting”. The bête noir amongst British historians, Mr Deary, who penned over 200 history books for children and is one of the country’s best-selling authors, dismissed Ms Worsley’s day job as a waste of time:

“Royal palaces do not need curators; they are best left to rot away.”

Ms Worsley remains unfazed. She called Mr Starkey “an old owl” and wisely refused to engage with Mr Deary: “I admit to being an entry-level historian and don’t mean to have the last word on anything or put across an authoritative view that is not to be challenged. I try to show that history can, in fact, be fun. While doing so, I may step on a few toes.”

Away from the cameras, Mrs Worsley is much less flamboyant, admitting to a penchant for frugality and a minimalist lifestyle. According to friends, she is also quite reserved. The Guardian called her that rarest of beings: an introverted show-off. Ms Worsley, an accomplished author, last month stormed the best seller lists with Jane Austen at Home, a 400-page tome that sheds new light on the most famous of chroniclers of Victorian domestic life.

Much anticipated, the book promptly set off a storm in a teacup – now dubbed Pride and Plagiarism – over liberties taken with a 2013 biography of Jane Austen by Paula Byrne. The issue revolves mostly around Mrs Byrne’s discovery that the desk at which Jane Austen wrote most of her oeuvre afforded a sea view as depicted in an until recently ignored portrait of the author. This setting, it is argued in both books, linked Jane Austen’s Hampshire home to the world beyond.

Though hardly an issue to disturb most readers, it testifies to Ms Worsley’s enhanced status that her every word is weighed and measured against known fact and established academic convention. So far, no-one has inveighed against Ms Worsley’s credentials as a historian of note. With her television programmes and books she provides a welcome bridge between unassailable academia and the easily-digestible histrionics proffered by less scrupulous merchandisers of the past.


Kristalina Georgieva, CEO of the World Bank: Empowering Communities

[caption id="attachment_12038" align="alignright" width="263"] CEO: Kristalina Georgieva[/caption]

Worldwide, around 500 million people live in “fragile situations,” mostly caused by armed conflict. Climate change threatens to add another hundred million or so people to that tally by 2030 – just thirteen years from now. And of the 800 million people living in extreme poverty, most live in middle income countries. World Bank CEO Kristalina Georgieva leads about 10,000 development professionals of the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and the International Development Association (IDA) – the World Bank’s arms for middle-income and poor countries that mobilise funds and find solutions to the world’s most taxing and intractable challenges.

A passionate humanitarian who was responsible for the European Union’s emergency aid budget between 2010-2014, Mrs Georgieva applies a holistic approach to development that is focused on people, environment, and institutions both at the global and local level. Immediately before returning to the World Bank at the beginning of this year, where she previously held a number of senior positions, she was in charge of the EU’s €150 billion annual budget as a commission vice-president. Her top priority is helping the world’s most marginalised and vulnerable people. IDA maintains nearly a thousand projects in 11,000 locations in 76 countries including many fragile states and small states for some $90bn. Just a few months ago, this fund saw its biggest replenishment in its 50-years history, with $75 billion to invest over the next three years.

"Today’s World Bank is a veritable laboratory of financing as we seek to fill the investment gap. Pushing innovation in development is perhaps not new to the World Bank."

“Those who have least access to the corridors of power are at risk of not having their voices heard. Yet, lasting success is only possible through the inclusion of all people, women and men, for ethical, moral, and economic reasons,” she says. For example, excluding women from economic life shears off growth by up to 37% of the countries’ GDPs. “Gender inequality stunts growth and causes billions to be forfeited – wealth that could have helped address housing, nutritional, and healthcare needs.”

Development remains a complex, long, and multi-faceted process. “Ushering young girls into schools means that better-educated women will eventually enter the workforce. This, in turn, assures that these young women have a disposable income which they’ll want to control through, for example, mobile banking. That promotes financial inclusion – a most important stepping stone. This all adds significantly to a woman’s dignity and sense of self-esteem. By controlling their own wages, quite a few women will seek to increase their income by investing in tools and starting micro businesses. Soon not just immediate family but entire communities benefit from their work and entrepreneurship.”

It is easier to implement projects that produce visible results in the short term. It is harder to maintain long-term investments in areas such as education. “Yet ignoring these vital areas virtually assures that a country will keep struggling to gain a measure of prosperity.” The bank builds a strong economic case for such interventions and backs them up by measuring the results. In Afghanistan, the number of children in school has increased eightfold from just a million over the last fifteen years. Most of them were boys but today 40% of all students are girls.

“Countries that fail to concentrate on their human capital are, simply put, setting themselves up as tomorrow’s losers.” The bank is working on the development of a Human Capital Index for countries and its 2018 World Development Report (WDR) Learning to Realize Education’s Promise highlights education’s crucial role in eradicating poverty.

The map of macro aspects of development issues that she is facing across emerging markets and developing economies is unnerving. “Think about just getting most children, boys and girls, into schools, and teaching them what is needed.” Some 600 million young people will shortly be entering the workforce – around two-thirds of them in developing nations. The jobs they seek do not yet exist and at the same time disruptive technologies are changing the nature of work as we know it. “Building the necessary physical and digital infrastructure required to embrace the future requires investments at scale. On the other hand, you have trillions of dollars earning low returns and seeking greater profitability. How do we identify and remove the barriers to make what should be, but isn’t, happening – shifting significant resources towards development? This includes working on the regulatory and investment environment, systematically going through obstacles to investments, and managing risks. And this is where IBRD, which has invested just under $700 billion in middle-income countries since its establishment, is shifting its focus.” Mobilising resources at scale towards development is difficult, but particularly daunting when it needs to take place in countries torn apart by conflicts or plagued by weak institutions. This is when the concessional resources of IDA can be effective in crowding in private finance.

An important part of making investing in developing countries less risky is helping manage vulnerabilities to disasters and shocks. This goes beyond the bank’s traditional role in helping countries maintain a strong macro-economic environment. It considers outbreaks of catastrophic infectious disease to be one of the greatest systemic risks facing the global community. Its first-ever pandemic bond was oversubscribed, raising $322m in two separate issues with a three-year maturity. The bank simultaneously issued $100m worth of swaps for added protection. The bond has regular coupons attached to compensate investors for a loss of value in case a pandemic breaks out. The issue forms part of a strategy to create an insurance market for pandemic risk and leverages the bank’s capital market expertise and unparalleled understanding of public healthcare issues. Previously it has successfully launched $1.6bn worth of catastrophe bonds to respond to natural disasters and sustainable development bonds that promote ethical and impact investing. These contingency instruments proved their value during the recent wave of natural disasters which struck the Caribbean and Mexico.

Mrs Georgieva is keen to leverage the World Bank’s leadership role in financial engineering as a catalyst for development and sustainability. “Today’s World Bank is a veritable laboratory of financing as we seek to fill the investment gap. Pushing innovation in development is perhaps not new to the World Bank. The scale and speed of the effort is, however, unprecedented and now matches global needs more closely.” The bank is working intensively in areas like clean energy, climate-smart agriculture, sustainable urbanisation, and disaster risk management. It is committed to reaching the target of 28% climate-related programmes by 2020. It pioneered the introduction of green bonds, a market which has surpassed $100 billion, and is working with countries on the development of green bond markets, which led to the issuance of the world’s first green sukuk (Islamic bond) by a Malaysian issuer earlier this year.

But the CEO is just as keen to give equal weight to the bank’s effectiveness at the micro-level as she is on sharpening its impact at the macro-level. “People know what they need and have a keen sense of priority. We need to find the voices of citizens so they can define their own pathways for development.” Mr Georgieva recalls a programme in Indonesia, implemented at the height of the financial crisis in Asia. Instead of allocating block grants the traditional way, it was decided to hand the available funds directly to local authorities – those in direct contact with the population. All it took to ensure that the funds reached the people for whom they were intended was a whiteboard. “We first asked the community what projects were most needed and how much money was required for their implementation. We then proceeded to write all relevant details – project description, cost, and the name of the official responsible – on a whiteboard placed in the centre of the community. That was all.”

Learning experiences such as these have helped steer the World Bank towards a slightly different direction. Its staff is actively working in the field with people who need their help and listening to what they have to say. This boots-on-the-ground policy helps the World Bank expand its presence in under-served places so that it can build the conditions that help it engage and gain trust. This is particularly important for succeeding in countries that have the highest needs but the weakest capacity to deal with them.

Empowering communities to take charge of and invest in their own progress increases the effectiveness of projects by reducing the costs associated with monitoring. Mrs Georgieva’s faith in people and her commitment to empowering them to fulfil their potential is her greatest motivation. “I strongly believe that communities know best how to meet the challenges they face. It is up to us to provide the resources, and up to them to achieve the best possible outcomes.


FFA Private Bank: Trusted Partner

FFA Private Bank’s strategic vision is to remain the foremost private bank in the Middle East by offering a complete range of financial products and banking services to affluent individuals, their families, and their businesses as well as to corporations, banks, and financial institutions.

The term private bank reflects the commitment to a certain style of banking. Under this scheme, FFA Private Bank engages in an ongoing long-term relationship with its clients, ensuring that each one of them receives truly exceptional service and personalised attention. Through its headquarters in Beirut or its subsidiary in the Dubai International Financial Center (DIFC), the bank’s services are delivered via distinct divisions, each with its own area of expertise but linked by the same values. The bank’s core values serve as a frame of reference and are shared by people at every level of the company:

Integrity – The bank practices the highest standard of personal and corporate ethics in all its interactions, continually strengthening its heritage of building long-lasting relationships through honesty, fairness, trust-worthiness, and reliability.

Performance and professionalism – The bank recognises, rewards, and promotes outstanding performance. Its commitment to excellence lies in the constant improvement of its management practices and know-how. The bank conducts its business relationships with the highest level of professionalism.

Compliance – The bank acknowledges the significance of all laws, regulations policies, and standards pertaining to its industry, both internal and external, and complies with them at all times.

Profitability – The bank strives for sustained profitability, which in turn enables it to carry out its business initiatives, make long-term investments, ensure job security, and provide attractive returns for its shareholders. Moreover, FFA Private Bank is committed to maintaining the highest standards of corporate governance and anti-money laundering (AML) compliance. FFA Private Bank offers private wealth management, asset management, capital markets services, corporate and investment banking services, and real estate services.

Private Wealth Management

The Private Wealth Management Division is where clients – whether individuals, families, institutions, or trusts – receive highly customised financial advice and investment solutions for their substantial net worth. Protecting the client’s assets while securing their long-term objectives is always the priority; the private banker’s role vis-á-vis the client, is to maximise risk-adjusted returns.

"FFA Private Bank is a relationship-focused bank. The bank’s mission is to deliver exclusive, innovative and personalised solutions to high-net-worth individuals and families, their companies, and trusts."

Developing strong client relationships is an essential building block in reaching this goal. Capitalising on FFA Private Bank’s internal capabilities and its premier access to institutional resources, the Private Wealth Management Division offers a wide scope of investment products and services as well as fiduciary current accounts, term deposits, local and international payment facilities, and a broad range of lending facilities. The numerous correspondent banking relationships that FFA Private Bank enjoys, enable its private bankers to feel unconstrained in terms of the various investment solutions and value they can offer to clients. By working on a true open architecture basis, the bank provides investors with access to any asset class or money manager on a global basis.

[caption id="attachment_12049" align="alignright" width="400"] FFA Private Bank[/caption]

FFA Private Bank is a relationship-focused bank. The bank’s mission is to deliver exclusive, innovative and personalised solutions to high-net-worth individuals and families, their companies, and trusts. Private wealth management bankers strive to anticipate client needs and provide the best possible service through the establishment of long lasting relationships based on transparency and trust.

Private wealth management bankers also guide the client through the various types of banking services provided: financial brokerage, asset management, real estate, deposits, loans, corporate and investment banking, credit cards, etc.

Through its Asset Management Department, FFA Private Bank provides professional investment services to its clients in a number of ways, tailored to the needs of individual clients and through funds and discretionary accounts mandates, by consistently keeping clients informed, focusing on risk-adjusted returns, and rapidly adjusting to tactical opportunities and risks.

An Integrated Approach and Gateway

Over the last few decades, FFA Private Bank has emerged as a key player on the regional financial markets, building great relationships with private and institutional investors in the Middle East. The bank prides itself on its high level of service based on insightful recommendations, first rate execution, and performance-oriented back office.

Through a single capital markets platform, the bank provides its clients access to all financial markets – including the US, Europe, and the MENA region – allowing them to trade a wide array of instruments including OTC products, equities, fixed income, and derivatives.

Individual investors and professional traders can access the bank’s FFA Direct Pro + platform and trade online stocks, futures, options, forex, CFDs, bonds and funds, via web, smartphone, or tablet.

The Corporate and Investment Banking Department, with its high calibre and experienced team, offers a range of services to local and regional companies with the aim to helping them increase their corporate value, expand, and unlock greater shareholder value.

FFA Private Bank’s range of corporate and investment banking services include:

Valuations,

Mergers and acquisitions advisory and transactions,

Financial restructuring,

Raising equity and debt, and

On balance sheet corporate lending.

The versatile open platform, as well as thorough screening and due diligence process, allows the bank to get involved in deals that are geographically located across the globe, thus providing access to regional and international opportunities that are both unique and diversified.

Successful and Resilient in Real Estate

The bank’s real estate division, FFA Real Estate, has established itself as a leading provider of real estate investment opportunities to the bank’s client base through combining in-depth market knowledge with industry expertise to offer comprehensive solutions to clients and investors. Real estate advisory services include optimising current portfolios, carrying out due diligence services in order to structure transactions, raising equity, and providing the investors with access to attractive and carefully selected international opportunities.

With its signature customer-centric approach, FFA Real Estate continually works to strengthen relationships with tenants and investors while introducing new product concepts. Throughout every stage of development, from conception to long-term management, the focus is on energy efficiency, sourcing of sustainable materials, and the life cycle capital costs of buildings. While implementing this unrelenting approach to sustainability, FFA Real Estate maintains the emphasis on surpassing investment expectations.

Expertise in appraising opportunities takes FFA Real Estate beyond the region to offer a global perspective, pinpointing real estate markets in which investors can tap into such benefits, which include residency permits, citizenship, or favourable tax regimes.

FFA Real Estate, through its extensive knowledge of global citizenship programmes and its trusted experts, acts as a consultant to help the client choose the best programme that suits his or her needs.


Tim Cook: Taking Care of Business

He wants to be remembered as a good and decent man. Not that he’s going anywhere, anytime soon: Apple CEO Tim Cook (56) is determined to take proper care of the legacy left by the company’s visionary founder Steve Jobs (1955-2011) who is the closest thing the IT universe has to a deity. Mr Cook, in contrast, does not at all aspire to immortality: he merely wishes to perpetuate the ethos of his predecessor – attention to detail, beauty in simplicity, and a relentless dedication to perfection.

It is by no means easy to walk in the great man’s shoes. Apple-diehards – a breed contemptuous of anything not graced by a half-eaten fruit – have accused Mr Cook of blandness and a lack of originality, two great sins. However, Tim Cook is perhaps best explained as a loving and caring father who coaches a contrarian and slightly rebellious adolescent to maturity.

No longer the exclusive domain of the self-anointed über hip, Tim Cook’s Apple has grown up and can now be depended upon to consistently deliver quality. Though the company is no longer at the absolute cutting edge of technology, ceding ground to relative newcomers and even to – horror of horrors – old-school tech giants such as Microsoft, Apple can still be relied upon to push holistic processes that bring together a host of devices which, until quite recently, were largely unaware of each other’s existence.

"Under Mr Cook, the company has become an oasis of peace with a zero-tolerance policy towards people with disagreeable personalities and larger-than-life egos."

Unveiling a new and slightly improved product line in early June at Apple’s annual developer conference in San José, California, Mr Cook received considerable flak in the press for underwhelming the assembled crowd. The company’s only truly new product, the HomePod loudspeaker scheduled for launch just before this year’s festive season, seems to fall in the me-too category, streaming music and giving the company’s AI incarnation Siri a presence in the living room where she will compete against Amazon’s already fairly well-established Alexa who takes orders, and provides answers, through Echo – the online retailer’s speaker pod.

What most of the specialist press fails to pick up on is that Tim Cook doesn’t like to boast or talk about projects under development – preferring instead to keep things under wraps until the technology has matured and is ready for market. The tip of the veil is occasionally lifted to show investors that Apple has not fallen asleep at the proverbial wheel such as when the company confirmed speculation that it is working on a self-driving automobile which may be manufactured in-house. Detroit has been warned.

With a leadership style that remains firmly focused on people, strategy, and execution, Mr Cook leaves it largely to the company’s engineers to come up with new products. He is not necessarily looking to replicate the original success of the iPhone – though that would be nice – but prefers to find ways to tightly integrate Apple’s current products – opting for evolution rather than revolution.

Under Mr Cook, the company has become an oasis of peace with a zero-tolerance policy towards people with disagreeable personalities and larger-than-life egos. A number of Apple-watchers – yes it is a thing – have remarked that Steve Jobs usually kept troublemakers aboard, recognising that their contributions to the company often outweighed their abrasive personalities. Tension and disagreement may have helped Apple scale great heights, it is not the way by which Mr Cook wants to further the company. That is not to say Tim Cook can’t be curt and dismissive of others: shareholders who objected to Apple’s views on climate change and sustainability were told to “get out of the stock” if they did not share those concerns.

As an excellent corporate administrator, Mr Cook helped the company survive its near-fatal downturn during the latter half of the 1990s when revenues plummeted and the company was saved from bankruptcy by a $150m cash injection from none other than Microsoft. Under Mr Cook’s guidance Apple shot back, seeing its revenues multiply from a low of barely $6bn in 1998 – pocket change by today’s standards – to a whopping $215bn in 2016. Whilst others in the company were tinkering with the next-biggest-thing in computing, Tim Cook was working the spreadsheets – taking care of business.


Herald Land: UK Prime Real Estate

Established in 2009, Herald Land Real Estate Brokers caters to clients in the Middle East and around the globe. The firms sets the benchmarks in its market for secure investments and UK portfolio diversification.

The company started as land brokers. Though the UK land market will always remain its core competence, Herald Land is constantly adding to its portfolio which contains something to offer everyone. Herald Land aims to provide a variety of lucrative investments that suit all tastes and fit all budgets. From picturesque landscapes, trendy urban apartments, and airport parking to low entry-level profitable residential buy-to-let opportunities and student accommodations, investors are sure to find an investment that fits their preferences.

The UK has long been one of the world's most stable and progressive property markets, and one of the world's most popular destinations for wealthy individuals and business owners. The country offers a unique mix of outstanding social and political stability, a highly attractive taxation regime for those born overseas, and an excellent environment for business. Therefore, buying land in the UK is the perfect opportunity for a profitable and rewarding investment.

It is impossible to understand the business of any company, without appreciating the talents behind its success. Herald Land is run by what may be some of the most highly qualified professionals in the world. Their passion is the main driver of its success and their relentless exploration of market ambiguities, powered by their skills and competence, grant them the ability to take the right decisions at the right time, providing investors with the smartest solutions.

Herald Land considers human capital as the single most important ingredient bolstering its progress and the firm continues to celebrate its workforce diversity that comprises professionals from different parts of the world.

Why Choose the UK?

The United Kingdom is the fifth largest economy in the world and the second largest in Europe with GDP of $2.6 trillion. It is a country rich in cultural identity, natural beauty, and a stable economic and political environment, all of which encourage many investors to invest in the UK.

The country welcomes tourists from all corners of the globe which presents a tremendous investment opportunity in real estate. The UK also boasts an excellent road and transport infrastructure that allows easy access to almost everywhere within the country.

Following the Brexit referendum in 2016, the depreciation of the British pound against the US dollar and the AED made property prices more attractive to international investors, especially investors living in the GCC region. For example, earlier this year a £1m property would have cost AED 5.33m whilst that same property could now be acquired for only AED 4.56m.

Innovation and Culture

Herald Land believes in adding innovation and culture when it comes to developing new projects. The firm encourages its staff to bring to the light as many creative ideas as possible. Simple as it may seem, that usually drastically changes the way the company operates which eventually works to the advantage of its clients.

With different markets experiencing highs and lows – with deep plunges in some and frightening crashes in others – owning land or property in the UK will remain the most secure of all investments. The slump in formerly attractive markets has only served to increase the appeal of UK investments. For this reason, amongst many others, UK investments promise to offer a safe haven to the discerning investor.

A Timeless Investment Possibility

Herald Land does not just present investment possibilities: the firms aims to offer the seed for a lifetime opportunity – one that can drastically transform the way its clients invest. Herald Land raises the bar on exceptional on-point portfolio selections and keeps its clients spoilt for choice as the firm present prime locations, long-term development landscapes, areas well connected to excellent transportation networks, tourist hotspots, secure profitable properties, and much more – all of which are promising to constitute rare and unique opportunities to acquire and own prime assets.

Herald Land considers its UK land investment offerings as the firm’s core competence and its absolute competitive advantage. Herald Land is the market leader in UK real estate – it is always going up in value and the demand is forever increasing. It is incredibly reassuring to witness how land increases in value over the years and never decreases, unlike other investments, and that is exactly what makes land investment the most timeless of all types of investments.


GVK Biosciences: Pushing the Envelope

GVK Biosciences is one of the largest India-based discovery, development, and manufacturing solutions provider to the biopharma industry. Established in 2001, GVK Biosciences has over fifteen years of experience across the research, development and manufacturing value chain with a focus on speed and quality. The team of over 2,000 highly-qualified scientists – backed by well-defined and scalable processes, modern facilities, and a strong customer-centric partnering approach – focus on bringing customers’ products faster to market. GVK Biosciences partners with reputed global academic institutions and research laboratories to find efficient, cost-effective, and innovative solutions to their research, development, and manufacturing challenges.

Headquartered at Hyderabad, GVK Biosciences has over 2500 people working in the drug discovery, development & manufacturing space with business development teams spread across USA, Europe and the Asia Pacific Region. The company offers a continuum of drug discovery solutions from pre-hit to candidate selection and has expertise that spans across numerous therapeutic areas with a focus on oncology, pain/inflammation, and metabolic diseases. The company leverages its expertise in chemistry, biology, CADD, ADMET/PK, and animal disease models to provide customised and integrated models for drug discovery leading to pre-clinical candidates. GVK Biosciences has been successful in establishing a proven track record offering cost-effective, innovative, and highly efficient solutions towards delivering clinical candidates for its collaborators.

With an inherent work culture that thrives on ensuring Safety and Compliance, and a resolute Customer First approach, the company is working towards a new positioning to stamp its authority and leadership as a contract research and development organisation (CRDO).

The early stage drug discovery is a typical four to five-year process and involves enormous intellectual bandwidth that calls for companies such as GVK Biosciences – which dips into its research and development pool of around 2,000 high quality scientists with over 200 PhDs who work in this stage of the value chain. With nearly 70% invention happening in small & medium-sized firms, GVK Biosciences has kept a keen eye on this customer community.

The pharmaceuticals and life science sector has traditionally been knowledge-intensive with a focus on research and development. GVK Biosciences actively propagates the idea of partnering research with its over 400 global customers. The company has the following service lines:

Discovery solutions

Small Molecule

Discovery Chemistry solutions

Discovery Biology solutions

Large Molecule discovery solutions

Chemical development solutions

Formulation & analytical solutions

Contract manufacturing solutions

Industry Perspectives

The drug discovery CRO industry is witnessing major consolidation. Many Asia-based firms are enhancing their foothold in Europe and North America, and are tapping growing business opportunities. GVK Biosciences has established sales teams in both these geographies and is exploring this business with small and medium-sized pharma and biotech firms besides working with large companies.

Over the last two decades, the pharmaceutical industry has seen some radical changes. The unprecedented downsizing of the internal discovery of the big pharmaceuticals, patent expiration, and the shift towards biologics has led to a major externalisation and outsourcing of the drug discovery business globally. With the global pharmaceutical and life science industries seeking new sources of discovery and innovation with limited resources and countering Wall Street pressures, there is a growing preference to externalisation and embracing the concept of outsourcing of drug discovery.

Global R&D spend in the biopharmaceutical industry is estimated to be around $190 billion in 2016 and according to industry estimates, nearly 75-80% of the expenses can be outsourced. With a current penetration of around 58%, there is an opportunity for contract research organisations to tap this outsourcing trend in the drug discovery market. The global outsourcing market is estimated at $115.7 billion in 2016 of which 49% is accounted for through CROs. Among the $55.7 billion CRO market, 31.2% accounts for discovery-based service i.e. $17.4 billion in 2016 and the balance, 68.8%, accounts for pre-clinical and clinical services.

GVK BIO Discovery Solutions - Small Molecule

Discovery Chemistry
The company offers fully-integrated and stand-alone chemistry solutions from hit identification, hit to lead, lead optimisation, and development for pharmaceutical, biotechnology industries, and academic institutions. It also supports the research needs of fine chemicals and material science industries.

The key solutions offered under Discovery Chemistry include:

Medicinal chemistry

Synthetic chemistry

Peptide chemistry

Speciality chemistry

Library synthesis

Computational chemistry

Analytical chemistry

Discovery Biology
The company has wide-ranging capabilities in biology and offers very high-quality, seamless, and cost-effective solutions across the pharma and biotech value chains. Biological assessment of new molecular entities (NMEs) play a crucial role in ascertaining structure activity relationships, potency, selectivity, druggability, In Vitro, and In Vivo efficacy evaluation.

Capabilities range from reagent generation, high-throughput screening, assay development, bio-market validation, radiometric assays, DMPK, animal pharmacology (disease models) to exploratory toxicology for small molecules and biologics.

The animal facility at GVK Biosciences is accredited by AAALAC and CPCSEA (India) for the ethical treatment of animals. All the animal experiments are conducted in accordance with IAEC approved protocols. The rodent facility is also certified by OHSAS for complete compliance for health and safety of all employees.

Discovery Solutions - Large Molecule
Aragen Biosciences Inc., a wholly-owned subsidiary of GVK Biosciences, recognised for its scientific quality and flexibility is bringing over 150 years of combined industry experience. With scientists from reputed institutions, Aragen Biosciences performs complex projects in the following areas:

Antibody discovery

Protein production

In Vitro testing

Animal models

Stable expression

Bench scale process development

Formulation and stability testing

The company is based in Morgan Hills, California, and over the last ten years has been actively working with customers in US and other markets.

Chemical Development Solutions

Inogent Laboratories, another wholly-owned subsidiary of GVK Biosciences, delivers a seamless and innovative transition of services from lab to pilot plant to bulk manufacturing. The ability to resolve complex scientific problems with a systematic approach in a time-bound manner is a competency built over time with a resolute customer first approach. Customers include pharmaceuticals and producers of speciality chemicals, agrochemicals, polymers, oligonucleotides, animal health, and consumer products. The facilities have been inspected and accredited by global regulatory authorities and major pharma clients. The solutions offered include the following:

Route scouting

Process R&D

Bio and chemo catalysis

Carbohydrate chemistry

Eco-friendly synthetic route

Analytical method development and validation

Complete impurity profiling

Stability studies

CMC support

Contract Manufacturing Solutions

GVK Biosciences offers long-term contract manufacturing solutions in development, validations, DMF filing, manufacturing of new chemical entities (NCEs), key starting materials (KSMs), active pharmaceutical ingredients (APIs), and intermediates. With GMP production facilities, reactors with capacities ranging from 20 litres to 6,000 litres, support for process validation and DMF filing, expertise in handling hazardous reactions like cyanation, chlorination, high pressure reactions and a zero liquid discharge facility, GVK Biosciences offers a comprehensive suite of solutions to our large pharma customers.

Typically, the company follows three business models to support its customer needs:

Process optimisation, technology transfer, validations and DMF filing followed by manufacturing upon commercialisation;

Technology absorption, validations, DMF filing support and commercial manufacturing; and

Technology absorption and commercial manufacturing.

The manufacturing facility at Hyderabad has received approvals from worldwide regulatory authorities that include USFDA, EQDM, PMDA, KFDA, and WHO. These accreditations facilitate faster and easier approvals of DMFs/dossiers for business partners. The process development, technology transfer, and commercial execution teams collaborate seamlessly to provide concept to commercialisation timelines. The new facility at Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India is going to be commissioned shortly.

Formulation and Analytical Solutions

GVK Biosciences’ solutions include pre-formulation studies, formulation development, and analytical R&D, reformulation, and stability studies. It can also support clinical supplies and the manufacturing of exhibit batches in collaboration with partners and offer standalone analytical solutions for third party formulations products. In addition, the company offers regulatory and IP services through collaboration with third party consultants.

GVK Biosciences’ expertise lies in overcoming the challenges faced during development in terms of identifying risks and mitigating these timely, biopharmaceutical evaluation, solubility/dissolution improvement, stability indicating method development and impurity profiling, bioavailability enhancement, and achieving bioequivalence.

The capabilities of formulation and analytical solution include the following:

Pre-formulation studies

Salt, cocrystal, and polymorph selection

Preclinical formulation development

Clinical formulation development

Generic formulation development

Analytical method development and validation

Quality control and release

Impurity profiling and trace metal analysis

Stability and photostability testing

Extractable and leachable studies

Manni Kantipudi has been leading GVK Biosciences over the last ten years and passionately drives a customer first approach while ensuring “Safety & Compliance Always!” as a fundamental part of the company DNA. Along with the promoters of GVK Biosciences – DS Brar (former managing director of Ranbaxy, India’s largest pharmaceutical firm) and Sanjay Reddy (of GVK Group, India’s infrastructure giant) – he shares a dream of creating a $1 billion Indian firm in life sciences.

In his leadership role over the past decade, Mr Kantipudi has maintained a very healthy mix of customers across three regions – USA, Europe, and Asia-Pacific. GVK Biosciences conducts significant business with small and medium-sized pharma and biotech companies that are heavily engaged in innovation and the research and development of new molecules. The company also works closely with large pharmaceutical firms particularly for development and manufacturing.

GVK Biosciences has established practices, a strong leadership team, and also completed two acquisitions to build scale and expand the company’s services in the life science sector.


EFG Asset Management: Not Constrained by Benchmarks

[caption id="attachment_12096" align="alignright" width="557"] Chief Investment Officer and Senior Portfolio Manager: Moz Afzal[/caption]

A boutique with backing: New Capital is the funds arm of EFG Asset Management (EFGAM), the investment division of global private banking group EFG International which has a total of CHF144.5bn in assets under management. Whilst New Capital enjoys the benefits of a strong parent, autonomy is crucial to its DNA.

EFGAM offers a diversified range of specialist strategies within the equity, fixed income, and multi-asset space. These strategies are specialist in the sense they do not conform to the standard industry approach of managing money in a benchmark driven way. The firm instead believes in making investment decisions based on the sound analysis of the available opportunities – not on whether a security is included in a benchmark index. This is reflected across its New Capital product range.

The firm does not just offer expertise in one segment of the market. Its strategies are spread across a broad range of geographies and asset classes. The investment culture is collegiate and follows a cross-asset approach without silos. Instead, there is a network of talented managers and analysts sharing proprietary ideas and research, striving for company-wide investment excellence.

New Capital also does not have an investment style bias. It employs a macro framework that sets guidelines for managers and helps them identify opportunities. However, managers have flexibility to seek alpha through stock selection. This is well demonstrated by Michael Leithead, the firm’s head of Fixed Income and senior portfolio manager of the New Capital Global Value Credit Fund. In 2009, Mr Leithead helped launch the New Capital Wealthy Nations Bond Fund, the firm’s flagship fixed income fund, and three years later set up the New Capital Asia Value Credit Fund.

Chief Investment Officer and Senior Portfolio Manager Moz Afzal emphasises New Capital’s forte is in active management: “We adhere to a philosophy that is unique in the fixed income segment inasmuch as its thinking is centred on absolute returns. Credit and interest rate exposure are managed in a dynamic fashion. Credit selection uses a relative value approach.”

Mr Moz Afzal is lead manager on the New Capital Strategic Portfolio UCITS fund. He has also headed up the original Cayman-domiciled product since its launch in 2009. Mr Afzal is chairman of the EFGAM Asset Allocation Committee and has overall responsibility for the firm’s investment process.

Mr Afzal joined EFG Private Bank in 1994 and was appointed director and chief investment officer in March 2003, and director of asset management in January 2000. He previously ran fixed income funds and multi-asset portfolios, and has held supervisory roles in multimanager long-only and hedge fund investments. Prior to joining EFG, he was an investment analyst in the Macroeconomic Policy Division at HM Treasury.

“Active management is integral to everything we do and our managers are not constrained by benchmarks. Of course, we want to do well relative to peers and the market, but we are not obsessed with owning securities simply because they feature heavily in an index,” explains Mr Afzal.

In a world where passive funds are taking a growing market share, New Capital feels investors are unwilling to pay active fees for closet tracker portfolios. The firm’s funds offer genuine active management, therefore complimenting passive and more core benchmark-plus type offerings from other houses. Performance is also key to the New Capital ethos. The firm aims to have a high proportion of its funds in the top quartile at any one time.

The approach allows New Capital to create portfolios that benefit from rigorous analysis of global fundamentals and combine strategic thinking with active stock selection. New Capital is not looking to offer products in every category and will not launch funds just to satisfy the latest trend: the chosen approach is not that of mass distribution, rather the firm offers a focused portfolio of investment-led and relevant strategies.

In some cases, such as that of the New Capital Wealthy Nations Bond Fund, New Capital will cross traditional asset class borders to create a product it believes can offer strong, sustainable returns. New Capital will typically introduce funds in areas where it feels a long-term cycle is beginning, which often makes the firm appear contrarian relative to the wider industry.


Lord Waverley: The Shackles That (Still) Bind International Trade

The ‘Problématique’

Notwithstanding the continued march of globalism, cross-border global trade remains plagued by multiple barriers. These impede economic development, particularly in emerging market (EM) economies, and for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs).

EMs account for over 85% of the global population, almost 60% of global GDP, yet only 40% of world exports. And they are an economic driving force: since the 2007 to 2009 global financial crisis they have been responsible for fully four-fifths of global growth.

Even more fundamentally, SMEs are the backbone of all economies, and the driving force of much innovation, job creation, and growth. In the OECD for example, SMEs account for more than 90% of all enterprises, between 60% and 70% of all employment, and between 30 and 70% of the total value added. Their role in exporting, however, is much smaller than that of larger enterprises. Depending on the country, SMEs contribute between 15 and 50 % of exports, whilst between 20 and 80% of SMEs are active exporters. Overall, it is estimated that SMEs contribute between 25 and 35% of world manufactured direct exports. Where information exists, it points to these exports being concentrated around relatively few larger SMEs.

Thus, collectively small and mediums-sized firms are extremely important in their home economies, but take part disproportionally little in world trade.

And this matters. If, for example, SMEs were to have the same share in international trade as larger entities, it would bring many benefits, including more efficient global supply chains, enhanced competition and technology transfer, higher productivity, wages, and employment, and reduced EM dependency on aid.

Clearly one or more factors are inhibiting, or preventing, SMEs from exporting.

Inhibiting Factors

The factors inhibiting would-be international suppliers of goods and services are many, various, and multi-level. They range from lack of information and transparency; to problems of language and culture; to differing regulations and standards; and constraints on access to finance, insurance, and ultimate payment. International tendering and contracting in particular is simply too painful and too costly to undertake.

The result is that for many, exporting is simply too difficult, with such little practical support as is available being woefully inadequate.

The Resource Constraint

Companies in emerging markets generally have fewer resources with which to promote their exports than do their counterparts in the developed world; and the help available too tends to be less resolute.

SMEs for their part tend to be particularly resource constrained, in all countries, relative to their bigger corporate cousins; and in emerging market countries many face particularly severe constraints, with little internal capacity to identify, let alone follow up, potential opportunities.

Governments can help; but what they can offer is limited. In any case, governments should attempt to do only what only they can do – which is basically to provide a supportive macro environment, including a robust, fit-for-purpose institutional framework within which the private sector can thrive. Depending on their political philosophy, some governments will accept more, and some less, social and other responsibilities than others. But whatever the help provided by government, in all countries a major part of the challenge rests with the private sector. The playing field is far from level.

A further issue is that most governmental policies are intrinsically either national or at most region-wide: comparatively few efforts are made to approach these issues at the global level. A greater understanding is emerging of how best to assist companies globally in entering new cross-border markets; and the new technologies offer considerable scope for putting them into practice.

Some Important Overarching Principles

A number of overarching principles that ought to be regarded as central to any programme aimed at increasing cross-border trade include:

Taking both a truly top-down, global, and holistic approach.

Ensuring clear alignment of business, national, and international objectives.

Targeting policy especially towards SMEs and emerging markets.

Constructing policies in consultation with key stakeholders.

Growing an export culture and raising international ambition, including through government briefings, school education, improved teaching of modern languages, and advisory services.

Examining the range of existing policies, and best practice from around the world.

Setting up working groups that are government-backed.

Regulating to facilitate, rather than to control.

Seeking to eliminate inadvertent constraints, to put competition on an even footing internationally.

Key Areas of Focus

Some areas that are central to any programme aimed at increasing cross-border trade include:

Language and culture. Cross-border trade is reliant on overcoming language barriers and understanding cultural differences.

Legal and regulatory factors, including labelling, branding, patents, copyright and trademarks, rights of distributors/sales agents abroad, and compliance with local health and safety are cited by SMEs in particular as being a major obstacle to exporting. Harmonisation wherever possible is always of benefit.

Finance and insurance. Most firms are heavily reliant on (only a few) banks. Capital constraints often lead to trade finance and insurance options being restricted. Better and more financing options are needed.

New technology. Advances in technology continually change the game. Recently-developed software now enables lenders to interface with, and thereby monitor and analyse, key company data along supply chains, including all-important accounts-receivable information. As a result insurance companies are more willing to offer guaranteed fixed-term insurance; banks are more willing to lend to such companies, sooner, more cheaply, and in greater volume. It has also facilitated early payment to suppliers.

Awareness. Firms need to know about the support that is available otherwise take-up remains low.

A one-stop information hub. A true ‘one-stop shop’ that brings together all that is needed, including importantly the brining together of suppliers and buyers, in a user-friendly centralised information hub will perforce need to be at the heart of it all.

Steps are being made in the right direction. Supplyfinder is a new multi-language “industry matchmaker” platform providing organisations around the world with a comprehensive range of practical services, to help them deepen exiting markets, open up new opportunities; and to advance international trade and investment across 195 countries.

About the Author

Lord Waverley (JD) (Member, House of Lords, London) is the founder & CEO of SupplyFinder.com.

Contact: jd@supplyfinder.com


Evan Harvey, Nasdaq: Stock Exchanges - An Engine for Sustainable Development

The modern stock exchange is a hybrid institution: listing venue, market steward, investment and regulatory liaison, product and service creator, and so on. To further complicate matters, many stock exchanges are now public companies themselves, listed on their own markets and beholden to their own investors. This complexity does, however, offer at least one intriguing benefit: of all economic institutions, exchanges are perhaps best positioned to drive inclusive, transparent, and sustainable practices.

Exchanges already exert a certain amount of regulatory authority over listed companies. Whether this authority is granted explicitly by the government or established by industry guidelines and operational codes, exchanges routinely require companies to report on certain aspects of their operation in order to qualify for the capital-raising opportunities afforded by the market. These reports are mostly focused on good governance, but trends lately have tended towards other indicators, such as climate risk and gender parity. Some exchanges (in Brazil, India, and Hong Kong, for example) have built these ESG disclosures into their listing rules; others have issued non-binding ESG reporting guidance to their listed companies.

The world’s stock exchanges are also useful and scalable engagement platforms. Their position at the nexus of so many key players allows for enhanced and accelerated debate across the entire investment ecosystem. It is clear why the United Nations believes that exchanges might be excellent drivers for progress on Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 17: “to strengthen the means of implementation and revitalise the global partnership for sustainable development.” In the spirit of SDG 17, the UN is collaborating with the exchanges to move beyond ESG reporting and into the realm of lasting value creation.

"The world’s stock exchanges are also useful and scalable engagement platforms. Their position at the nexus of so many key players allows for enhanced and accelerated debate across the entire investment ecosystem."

The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) has collaborated with the World Federation of Exchanges (WFE) on a new report, titled The Role of Stock Exchanges in Fostering Economic Growth and Sustainable Development. The paper does exactly what its title implies, examining how stock exchanges can promote economic growth and sustainable development.

UNCTAD is an acknowledged thought leader on all kinds of global economic issues, covering trade, investment, and development for the UN General Assembly since 1964. UNCTAD has been a leading advocate not only for the SDGs, but also the 2015 Addis Ababa agenda for financing economic development. Partnering with the WFE on this project makes sense. The WFE represents over two hundred of the world’s leading market infrastructure providers, including virtually all stock exchanges.

Their joint report was launched at the recent WFE Annual Meeting in Bangkok, Thailand. Introductory matter covers how modern stock exchanges really operate, and why they offer essential solutions to long-term economic problems. A fair amount of space is devoted to a key concept: exploring the symbiotic relationship between financial development and economic development. In other words, does the development of financial systems and tools simply follow economic signals, or does it actually drive economic development on a grand scale?

“The link between the financial economy and the real economy,” according to the report, “is that financial market development promotes economic development by facilitating the mobilisation of capital, and enabling risk sharing and risk transfer.” In addition – or perhaps as a consequence – exchanges are keenly interested in driving better governance processes.

Some argue that the markets may not always serve as organic drivers of long-term economic development. A fair amount of blame for excessive short-termism and other potentially corrosive market impacts is laid at the feet of exchanges, where extra volume can mean extra revenues. Day trading, excessive speculation, and technology-assisted boom and bust trends “may create a disconnect between the real and the financial economies,” according to the report, “resulting in a misallocation of capital and potentially destabilising economic consequences.” But exchanges more than counterbalance this by increasing “the ability of entrepreneurs, as well as more established corporations with expansion plans, to access the capital they need to grow their businesses.”

The WFE closely examines statistical and evidentiary signals in order to drive best practices. And given the industry’s increased focus on sustainability over the last few years, this report shows that it is certainly responding to the needs of its members. But there is another, more practical implication: in terms of economics, the good simply outweighs the bad.

“While the academic literature is in agreement that there is a positive link between well-functioning financial markets and economic development,” writes WFE CEO Nandini Sukumar in a preface to the report, “there is no blueprint to guide practitioners as to what combination of policies, incentives, and structures is required to produce a well-functioning market.” Exchanges are clearly valuable – though often unheralded or underappreciated – economic actors. This report helps to establish a framework for their action.

The impact of exchange practices on small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) is an essential concern. SMEs drive most of the world’s economic activity and job growth, but are also subject to the most difficult business restraints: low capital investment and no credit access. Exchanges are frequently preoccupied with SMEs because of the difficulty in bringing them to market. Many exchanges have, in fact, developed SME-centric exchanges – Nasdaq Nordic has the First North Exchange, London Stock Exchange has AIM, among many others.

These markets generally offer lower listing fees, reduced entry criteria, and streamlined access to additional capital – but also less frequent (and less stringent) reporting requirements. Some of this clarifies sustainable economic development opportunities, specifically in emerging economies, and some might make sustainability performance measurement more opaque. The paper provides a robust overview of how SME-centric exchanges venues in Africa have navigated these concerns in that region. Again, the good seems to outweigh the bad.

When it comes to specific exchange practices, UNCTAD and WFE focus the discussion on three main leverage points: green bonds, green indexes, and sustainability disclosure. Of the first, little more needs to be said. With more than $200bn in issuances this year, this instrument has attracted investors of all kinds. Indeed, there’s less debate over the market value of green (or climate) bonds than there is related to the proper definition of a green bond itself. Eleven exchanges have listed green bonds so far, with other likely to soon follow.

“By listing green bonds,” the report says, “stock exchanges can play a leading role in the growth of this market by promoting standards for assurance and guidance for issuing green bonds, while opening new channels of finance for climate mitigation and adaptation projects.”

Almost forty exchanges now offer some kind of ESG index product, in addition to established offerings from FTSE-Russell, MSCI, Standard & Poor’s, Thomson Reuters, and others. These indexes attract investor attention and raise the business profile of ESG performance as a viable market differentiator. As a consequence, they also call attention to outperforming companies and drive better ESG disclosure.

The bond and index future seems particularly bright, but exchange-driven ESG disclosure still lingers in the shadows. Less than half of the world’s exchanges (32) provide ESG reporting guidance of any kind to their issuers, and fewer still (12) incorporate it into their listing rules. While this represents a significant amount of improvement over the last few years, progress has been slow.

As the stock exchange industry steadily walks towards consensus on ESG reporting, the global reporting frameworks and standards-setting bodies have been racing there. Partnerships and collaborations between many of the leading organisations (GRI, CDP, SASB, UNGC) have been announced in 2017. Most of these organizations have already aligned their programmes with the UN SDGs. Last but not least, the final recommendations of the FSB Task Force for Climate-Related Financial Reporting were published in June.