Madhavan Sivashankar

Founder, CEO And Member Of The Board Of Directors(MBoD)

A seasoned banker with over 25 years of experience in multinational banks like American Express Bank, ABN AMRO, Credit Suisse AG and Citibank, Madhavan brings along with him strong corporate leadership learning and business acumen.

With a proven track record of successful stints in his previous assignments, of which over a decade has been in the GCC, Madhavan possesses a keen understanding of the global financial services environment.

His strong relationship management skills augurs well with fulfilling client needs that enables him to drive the marketing strategy of GIFL.

Madhavan is a commerce graduate from the University of Pune and has obtained an MBA from IMDR, Pune. He is also certified in Banking and Finance by the New York Institute of Finance (NYIF).

Sharad Gupta

MD, Head – Corporate Finance & IB Advisory And MBoD

Sharad is an industry veteran with a specialized career spanning over two decades, majority of which were spent at Citibank NA in credit, coverage and leadership functions. His experience has been in India initially and then in Bahrain and the U.A.E. In his most recent assignment, Sharad was the Corporate and Investment Banking Head for Abu Dhabi and Levant at Citi. He has also worked within the Corporate Finance function at Standard Chartered Bank in the region.

M&A advisory, rating advisory, capital raising and risk management advisory for clients in India and GCC is his forte.

Sharad holds a Bachelor’s degree in Electrical Engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee, India and an MBA from the Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta, India.

Vishnu Deuskar

Principal Advisor & MBoD

Vishnu is a seasoned banking and finance professional with 43 years of experience in the Middle East, India and Africa.

Vishnu’s professional experience has been mainly in financial markets, covering Debt, Equity, Foreign Exchange, Treasury Management, Mergers & Acquisitions and Project Finance.

His last banking position was that of Managing Director of Global Markets, MENA Region, at ABN AMRO Bank. Since 2010 he is the founder and Managing Director of Salvus Advisors DMCC, Dubai, UAE. Prior to that, he has held a number of senior and board-level positions in India, Middle East and Africa.

Vishnu enjoys excellent relationships and a high degree of trust with a large number of banks and companies in India and the Middle East.

George Abraham

Strategic Advisor And Member Of The Board Of Directors

George is the former Executive Vice President & Head of Specialized Industries Group, Wholesale Banking at Emirates NBD and Group Head of Corporate Banking at First Gulf Bank and is a banking veteran with over 40 years in the industry of which over 30 years has been in the GCC.

George’s in-depth knowledge of the local markets and longstanding successful relationships with corporates, banks and financial institutions in the region will be valued in continuing to strengthen GIFL’s position.

André Rauber

Advisor To The Board Of Directors

André is a senior Swiss banker with 33 years of experience in Finance and Technology.
After a decade in corporate and private banking at Credit Suisse André worked for two start-up companies before 2001 co-founding Braingroup, a Fintech company focused to date on digitalizing the advisory processes for bank and insurance companies in Switzerland. He subsequently worked another 5 years as Sales & Account Manager bridging finance and technology for Avaloq (leading Swiss Core Banking System provider) and Business Objects (Business Intelligence leader, now part of SAP).

Before relocating to Dubai in early 2017 André served for a decade as an Executive Director at UBS Wealth Management, covering Emerging Markets from Latin America to Middle East to Asia.

André holds a Swiss Master of Law degree, an Executive MBA from International Bankers School Chicago and is a certified Wealth Manager in Switzerland and Singapore. He is fluent in English, German, French, Portuguese, Italian and Spanish.