The Middle East and North African region and in particular the Gulf has seen an explosion of private equity activity over recent years. Private equity has grown from almost nothing in the early 2000s to the – almost – fully formed industry we see today. Fund-raising activity in MENA, for example, saw a compound annual growth rate of 30 percent between 2005 and 2008, with US$6.4bn raised in 2008, according to figures compiled by Zawya. The figures also show that an overwhelming 86 percent of transactions in the MENA region in the ten years from 1999 to 2008 were completed in the last three.
Read more