176: Beyond the Silk Roads: Middle Eastern Venture Investing - With Noor Sweid, Founder and Managing Partner of Global Ventures
Money Maze Podcast
Money Maze Podcast
4.8 • 216 Ratings
🗓️ 5 June 2025
⏱️ 49 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Noor Sweid explains her journey, from early career in management consultancy and relocating to Dubai, followed by growing and listing a business on the London Stock Exchange and NASDAQ Dubai in 2008 (Depa), through to establishing her VC business, Global Ventures, in 2018.
She sets the scene for the investing dynamics of MENA (Middle East North Africa), where the domestic market comprises 450 million people, half of whom are below 30 years old.
Noor explains both the geographic and industry opportunities, why she established Global Ventures, and the priorities in their investment process.
From fintech, agritech, consumer goods and solving the most pressing medical challenges, she details their approach, selection criteria, and the characteristics they look for.
She explains how they prioritise, how much they become involved in their investee companies, what they look for in “winning entrepreneurs” and why they believe their success rate can be higher than typical industry norms.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Welcome to the MoneyMays podcast. |
| 0:04.7 | If this is your first time joining us, I'm the host, Simon Brewer, |
| 0:08.4 | and in this show, we talk to proving leaders and thinkers from the worlds of business, investing from beyond. |
| 0:14.4 | Money talks and money moves. |
| 0:17.1 | What direction would you choose? |
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| 0:35.3 | platforms. |
| 0:36.3 | Thank you for listening. |
| 0:41.0 | The Arab Empress Zinobia was a third century queen of the Palmyran Empire in Syria, known for her bold |
| 0:46.3 | defiance against Roman rule and her ambitious military campaigns. She conquered Egypt and much |
| 0:51.8 | of Asia Minor and declared independence from Rome, and her reign was marked by intellectual and cultural flourishing as she welcomed scholars and philosophers to her court. |
| 1:00.7 | She was a symbol of leadership. |
| 1:02.5 | Well, today we welcome an inspiring 21st century female Syrian figure, one of the Middle East's most powerful angel investors and venture capitalists, |
| 1:15.7 | enlisted in Forbes 100 most powerful businesswoman in 2024. |
| 1:21.4 | Norse Wade, Tasha Raffoonar, Bimari Fatiga, Washkaran, is hereatakan. |
| 1:24.5 | Simon, shokran that you're having me here. |
| 1:26.7 | It's a pleasure to be her, Sharafit. |
| 1:29.3 | And absolutely humbled and honored to be even in the same frame of reference as Zonobia. She's been such an inspiration to |
| 1:35.1 | history, to women around the world. So really, really humbled. And thank you for having me on |
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