Omar El-Shenety ’05: AUC is the Best Return on Investment in Education

For Omar El-Shenety ’05, founder of Multiples Group boutique investment bank in Dubai, AUC was a turning point in his life. Today, he is seeing the return on investment in his education and is choosing to do the same for future students.

“I was able to make it to AUC, thanks to the merit scholarship and financial aid that were offered, and would like to see AUC giving the same opportunity to more people, so I have to give back,” said El-Shenety, who has contributed to the AUC Annual Fund, named a tree on the New Cairo campus and a study table in the AUC Library, and had his named engraved on the AUC Memory Wall.

I believe the years we spend at AUC are the best time to invest in our lives afterward.," El-Shenety continued. "Hard work, studying and extracurricular activities don’t go in vain. Alumni should invest some of their time and money in supporting AUC. At the end of the day, it is AUC’s reputation and the consistency of its quality that is keeping the value of our degrees a source of pride.”

Holder of a Global Executive MBA in strategy and finance from Columbia Business School and the London Business School, El-Shenety fondly recalls his time at AUC, where he studied business administration and economics. “My experience at AUC was awesome, full of learning and great memories with colleagues and professors,” he said. “I learned a lot studying economics from some of the best professors at the time and also took useful finance courses from experienced professors who were seasoned executives. I also did lots of extracurricular activities, whether through charity clubs or political and economic conferences.”

Today, as head of Multiples Group, with private equity and investment banking practices focused on the Middle East and Africa, El-Shenety is able to put all the skills he learned to practice. “I believe the mix of solid education and rich extracurricular activities was very helpful,” explained El-Shenety. “Taking courses with experienced professors, many of whom had a huge track record and hands-on experience, was a good way to understand how business gets done. Extracurricular activities allowed me to work with teams and lead some of them, run budgets, manage suppliers and handle crises. Doing this as a student was a good role play for real-life business management.”

El-Shenety is also the founder of Quick-Wins, a Dubai-based consulting firm offering strategic advisory services to major corporations across the Middle East and North Africa, and is co-founder of Egypt’s House of Wisdom, a leading think tank covering pressing political and economic issues after the January 25 Revolution. He was also a consultant at Booz Allen Hamilton and financial analyst at Henkel, and periodically publishes articles analyzing key economic issues facing the Middle East, with a focus on Egypt.

If you would like to support the AUC Annual Fund, click here.