[UStart] Jury Members

Anas is a recognized expert with over 10 years of establishing digital strategies and implementing large-scale technology solutions on an enterprise-wide global basis with strong leadership abilities for identifying, building cases and implementing smart city solutions that are responsive to the needs of rapidly growing organizations and Disruptive industries. With proven track record of creative planning and execution in Digital Transformation, Ecosystems Integration, Innovations strategies and Smart City solutions in the UK, UAE, KSA, Singapore and Malaysia. Short listed for the Young Consultant of the Year award (2015-16) by the British Expertise International Awards and awarded the Best Contribution to Internationalisation 2015 – 2014 by the University of Manchester due to his contribution to academia and research in the Middle East. Anas is actively involved with Digital Britain and the UK Task Groups driving Innovations in the AECO Industries towards Smarter Cities. While contributing as a visiting professor at esteemed International Universities at undergraduate and postgraduate engineering and project management programmes.

Essam Disi is the Director of Strategy and Policy at the Mohammed Bin Rashid Est. for SME Development (Dubai SME), a government agency under the Department of Economic Development (DED) – Government of Dubai - tasked with the development of Entrepreneurship and Small & Medium Enterprises (SMEs) in Dubai. In his present job, his main roles and responsibilities are to formulate long-term plans, strategies and policy support framework for SME development, in addition to executing strategic initiatives to support the SME sector and the Entrepreneurial Ecosystem in Dubai. Mr. Disi is a member of the DED Economic Policy Committee, the Dubai 2021 plan team and the Dubai 2030 Industrial Strategy team. Mr. Disi is also a member of the judging panel of the Mohammed Bin Rashid Award for Young Business Leaders since 2008 and has been involved in assessing and evaluating hundreds of start-ups and high growth SMEs from all over the Arab World. In addition, Mr Disi is a founding member of Dubai SME100 and RATE, the main two initiatives to support high growth SMEs in Dubai.

Ibrahim “Abe” Seksek is the current COO of MENA and Russia of Startupbootcamp, a Rainmaking company. Before joining Startupbootcamp he Co-Founded a couple of companies such as ZenHR Solutions, which addresses the entire HR cycle, and Crystel, Jordan's first business process outsourcing (BPO) provider. Ibrahim also worked as Head of Global Operations Support for Naspers, the parent company of dubizzle and OLX, which oversaw the operations in 70 countries.

Krishnan Gopi is the Group Chief Disruption Officer at GEMS Education. He is currently on a mission to disrupt from within and create efficient, sustainable, scalable and future-ready technology capabilities for the needs of education today and tomorrow. Krishnan is a strategic technology leader with two decades of international experience and a successful track record spearheading technology-led business transformation for Fortune 100 companies. He was named “Digital Disruptive Leader of the Year” by MIT Sloan / Khaleej Times at DIGITRANS 2019 and 2018, and voted "Digital Disruptor of the Year" at CDO Conclave 2018 in addition to numerous other honours and awards.

Qussay Abdul Wahab, 44 years old, an Iraqi-Canadian citizen with over 24 years of entrepreneurial experience in gastronomy, information technology, supply chain management and SME advisory. During his MBA studies, Qussay decided to join the corporate world and started with Injazat Data Systems, an IT outsourcing company, as a business consultant. A year and a half later, in 2008, he joined Khalifa Fund for Enterprise Development as a business counselor assisting UAE Nationals to startup their own ventures. At his current position as an Enterprise Development Acting Senior Manager, Qussay has supported over 300 Emirati-based projects, manage a team of 18 Business Counsellors, and is considered as key team player within KF Management. In addition, he initiated and/or executed several strategic initiatives such as the Artificial Intelligence (AI) Mentor, Big Data through Business Intelligence, Public Private Partnerships (PPP), Khalifa Innovation Center (KIC), Kitchen Incubator, e-Knowledge platform, Agribusiness (Za’arie Program), and awareness campaigns (AKOUN, Technopreneurship). In the past, Qussay has successfully executed various business ventures as an entrepreneur. He is dedicated and client-focused. He obtained his Bachelor Degree in Economics from Concordia University, Montreal, Qc, Canada and was awarded an MBA degree in Strategic Management from the University of Strathclyde, Abu-Dhabi, UAE in 2010. Overall, Qussay is perceived as an intuitive, methodological thinker that loves the challenge; a self-starter that loves outside the box thinking. With good project management skills, strong business acumen and an eye for opportunities. Additional competencies to lead, manage expectations, resolve issues and coming up with solutions in a fun and attractive process all add up to his skills set