Samer is a Venture Partner with Iliad Partners. He has 20+ years of experience in technology, internet services, digital media, consulting and finance in MENA, Europe and Asia. Samer was previously GM of Dubizzle Property, a tech startup Founder and CEO, and Chief Product Officer of StarzPlay. Samer leads our investments in PropTech among other verticals.

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Samer was Chief Product Officer of StarzPlay Arabia, the leading premium OTT service of the Middle East. Samer was responsible for setting the product vision, prioritizing product and technical work, aligning the needs of users with the needs of the business, working closely with the CEO to maximise user engagement and revenues.

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Prior, he was the General Manager of Dubizzle Property, a role held for 3 years. Dubizzle is the largest online classifieds portal in the MENA region. Samer has responsibility of running all aspects of the Property portal including deciding on and setting direction for P/L, commercial, product, marketing arms of the vertical.

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Prior to Dubizzle, Samer was the co-founder & CEO of Istikana, a web based SVOD platform offering premium Arab TV and film programming. Started in 2011, Istikana was a leading independent Arabic streaming VOD service. As CEO Samer was led the team, drove business and product development as well as raising multiple rounds of VC financing.

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Prior to co-founding Istikana, Samer worked for 4 years as a strategy and early growth consultant at the Boston Consulting Group (BCG) based in Dubai, serving clients throughout the MENA region. He worked on several private and public projects within the telco, media and financial services sectors.

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Samer started his career in the late 1990s as a trader of financial derivatives, a role he had for 6 years trading in London, Hong Kong and Paris.

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In 2007 Samer completed in Masters in Business Administration from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Sloan School of Management. Prior to this, Samer earned his Bachelor of Science in Astrophysics from University College London (UCL).

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