CIO2CIO Interviews

Zubair Ahmed - Emirates Islamic Bank

Created: 05 April 2013

Zubair Ahmed studied computer science in Pakistan and started his career in IT with Mashreq Bank in the UAE in 1992 where he participated in many key projects and held various responsibilities, he was also part of the team that developed the strategy which lead to the birth of Mindscape, a Mashreq Bank owned IT services firm that focused on delivering advanced technology services and solutions to the banking sector in the Middle East.

In 2001 Zubair moved to Mindscape and held various management positions but six years later he elected to go back to his roots on the customer side by joining Dubai Bank as the Head of IT Business Management & PMO while the bank was undergoing its massive transformation to Islamic banking. In 2012, Zubair was appointed as Head of IT & Innovation for Emirates Islamic Bank.

Mr Ahmed’s hobbies include listening to music, fitness activities and spending time with his four sons. In spite of his hectic schedule, Zubair has recently authored a book called “Power to Kids” that focuses on applying quality and management principles to parenting. Published in the US, the book is available on Amazon.com.

Michaella Kerckhof - Majid Al Futtaim

Created: 28 July 2012

Michaella started her career in IT in Belgium as a developer. After two years she was promoted to development manager for the Central Securities Deposit organization. Four years later, she moved to applications consultancy and worked with Oracle in Belgium for seven years as a senior consultant. In 2000 she relocated to Dubai and joined Tejari.com as head of product development. In 2006 she became the CIO for Nakheel. She joined Majid Al Futtaim Properties in 2011 and she is excited to be leading the company's Business Transformation Project.

Michaella enjoys horse riding and swimming.

Ali Al Hamdany - Air Arabia

Created: 17 December 2011

Mr Al Hamdany started his career as a manufacturing engineer after completing his master’s degree in engineering product design in the UK. After a number of years he moved to IT and completed a second master’s degree in information systems in the UK.

Then he started working for IT companies like Logica and Sun Microsystems. Later on he had the opportunity to move to the UAE and join Air Arabia as one of the few people who started up the airline. Right now e is the Group Director of IT for the no frills airline.

His hobbies include, sports, diving, traveling.

Ghazi Qarout - Al Hilal Bank

Created: 12 August 2011

Mr Qarout started his career with Arab Bank as a programmer back in 1983. He participated in many projects within the bank including ATM systems and an end to end core banking deployments, he worked in several countries during his tenure with the bank.
After leaving Arab Bank, Ghazi consulted for Al Hilal Bank on IT strategy and deployment. In early 2010, he was appointed as the Head of IT of Al Hilal Bank where he is now Senior Vice President and CIO.
Mr Qarout is a backgammon expert, he also supports Barcelona and Liverpool football clubs in addition to the LA Lakers, his favorite basketball team.

Faizal Eledath - Dubai Bank

Created: 17 July 2011

Faizal joined Mashreq bank as a programmer in 1994, he handled several assignments including taking care of the contact centre, card portfolio and CRM.
In 2006 he joined Dubai Bank as a CIO reporting to the bank’s CEO. During that time the bank was undergoing a transformation from a conventional bank to an Islamic bank.
Mr Eledath enjoys non-fiction books, sports, movies and travel.

The Interview

CIO2CIO: Your company is in banking, how does that impact your work, how involved are you in the business itself?
Faizal: Our mission in IT is to become a key enabler to the business strategy by providing a high quality IT environment. That has been our guiding principle all along and we have been blessed in that the business has recognized the importance of IT. For the last three years, IT has been seen as strength for the bank. That is because we are living up to our mission of being a key enabler.

Nominate a CIO for our next Interview

Created: 19 August 2010

Nominate yourself or another CIO for the next CIO2CIO interview. This section strives to feature CIOs from different backgrounds, age groups, company sizes and various experiences and industries.

To nominate please contact the This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it..

Ali Al Mazmi - UAE Federal Electricity and Water Authority

Created: 13 May 2011

Mr Al Mazmi studied at Ajman University followed by diploma in France and some additional studies in Germany. He joined the FEWA (the UAE’s Federal Electricity and Water Authority) in 2005 as an operations engineer then he worked also as a telecommunications engineer and later on he was appointed as the enterprise GIS project manager. Following that he took over as the CIO of FEWA. Ali is an avid phone card collector; he has a comprehensive collection from more than 120 countries.

FEWA provides water and electricity to much of the UAE. It is involved in power generation, transmission and distribution as well as water purification and distribution.

Girish Chouhan - Motivate Publishing

Created: 02 April 2011

After graduation from business school where he studied commerce, marketing and digital strategies Girish got several IT certifications and started his career in 1994 as an instructor at a computer education institute. Soon after, he moved to central India where he joined the IT department of Kalani Group. Girish climbed up the ranks steadily until he was named IT Manager. During the dot com boom Kalani Industries started its own web venture and Girish was named as General Manager for Technology and later on VP Corporate Technology. A few years later Mr Chouhan joined the Singapore based Dodsal Group which operates in many sectors including engineering and construction, mining as well as infrastructure development and management. The move coincided with the deployment of SAP at Dodsal and after the successful completion of the project in 2004 Girish joined Motivate Publishing in Dubai where he heads information technology today.

Ed Capaldi - Gulf News

Created: 25 January 2011

Ed Capaldi studied European Business and Technology including lean manufacturing, just in time, how to design a factory such as a car assembly plant and how to manage supply chains in addition to studying robotics and programming. After obtaining his degree he was determined to use technology to bring competitive advantage to businesses but as luck would have it, he found himself in the leisure industry and soon running a big jazz club. Two years later he moved to a private telecommunications company where he helped change its direction and portfolio of products and services. At a later time Ed moved to Vistorm which was then an ASP (now part of HP) and from there to Principality Bank in Cardiff where he ran the IT infrastructure. Eight years ago Ed moved to Al Nisr Publishing (whose best known publication is Gulf News the most widely read English language newspaper in the Gulf) where he has full responsibility to information technology.