ABOUT HUSSAIN SAJWANI
Hussain Sajwani, a UAE national, is the founder of the global property development company, DAMAC Properties.
A self-made Emirati Businessman, Sajwani has been recognised as one of the most powerful Arabs, among many other accolades.
Sajwani is a pioneer of the property market expansion in Dubai. In the mid-90s, he built several hotels to accommodate the growing influx of people coming to the emirate to do business and trade. In 2002, he identified a growing market opportunity and established DAMAC Properties, which has grown to become the one of the largest property development companies in the Middle East and further afield.
To date, DAMAC Properties has delivered over 43,700+ homes and more than 30,000 in development, DAMAC Properties has projects in 10+ countries worldwide, including cities such as Dubai, Jeddah, Riyadh, Beirut, Amman, Doha, Baghdad, the Maldives, Toronto, Miami, and London.
DAMAC’s international projects include the 50-storey DAMAC Towers Nine Elms, a flagship project in central London which is branded by the iconic Italian fashion house VERSACE.
Further afield, DAMAC Properties is also developing in Toronto a partnership with Canadian developer Marlin Spring and has recently acquired grade A, sea-facing land in the upscale neighbourhood of Surfside in Miami Florida to build a branded luxury tower.
Additionally in Florida, the Company is working on multiple projects comprising thousands of single-family villas in another joint venture with reputed American developer FL Star.
As a natural addition to the real estate company, DAMAC Properties founded its own hotel management company to manage all its hotel units that it developed. Today, the Company oversees eight hotel properties under the brands Radisson, Paramount, Rotana and DAMAC Maison. Also, the Company is building a luxurious hotel resort in the Maldives, which will be run and operated by Mandarin International.
As market leader, DAMAC Properties has joined forces with the most recognisable lifestyle brands to bring distinguished living concepts. Projects include luxury apartments and villas with interiors by fashion-houses Versace Home, Fendi Casa, de GRISIGONO, Cavalli and Just Cavalli and the uniquely conceptualised Paramount Hotels & Resorts, which delivers serviced living at its most opulent.
With innovation and digitisation central to the organisation’s business ethos, The DAMAC Group (the parent company of DAMAC Properties) has also entered the data centre industry through ‘DAMAC Data Centres’ a data centre company that proactively builds, buys or partners to serve the next wave demand for data centre services. It is currently building such centres in Riyadh, Dammam, Turkey and Ireland.
Making its foray into the world of luxury fashion, The DAMAC Group acquired the Italian fashion group Roberto Cavalli SPA in 2019 and went on to acquire the Swiss luxury jewellery brand de GRISIGONO with the aim to leverage these brands and innovate them for a younger clientele, while preserving their global legacy and appeal.
As an astute businessman and investor, Sajwani also has a proven track record in the global equity and capital markets through his private investment division. Under this strategic investment division, he currently holds portfolios of securities in a number of regional and global markets.
The DAMAC Group focuses on investments in private equities, mergers and acquisitions and holds majority and minority holdings in publicly traded companies and industries like luxury fashion, real estate, hospitality, manufacturing and more. The group has substantial investments with top US-based fund managers such as Vista, Silverlake, Andreessen Horowitz, Thoma Bravo, Starwood, NEA, Founders Fund, Warburg, Pincus, KKR and Brookfield.
Sajwani resides in Dubai with his wife and four children, Ali, Amira, Abbas and Mehdi Sajwani.
Alongside his family, Sajwani advocates for access to quality education under the Hussain Sajwani – DAMAC Foundation, including the popular One Million Arab Coders an initiative that aims to empower one million Arabs with the language of the future, computer coding.
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