Founder & Managing Partner
Caravanserai Partners

Zubaid Ahmad is the Founder and Managing Partner of Caravanserai Partners LLC (“Caravanserai” or the “Firm”), a merchant banking boutique focused on M&A and sovereign advisory, strategic capital raising and private equity transactions. Mr. Ahmad established Caravanserai in mid-2017 and brings a 35+ year career at a number of leading global investment banks as senior advisor to corporates, asset managers as well as governments, across a range of strategic advisory and financing issues. He has also worked across all regions of the globe, both in developed and emerging economies, including broader Asia (including the GCC and Central Asia), Latin America and Africa, and enjoys an extensive network of public and private sector relationships.

Prior to founding Caravanserai, Mr. Ahmad was a Vice Chairman of Citigroup’s Institutional Clients Group and managed a number of different groups. These included serving as Co-Head of Global Asset Managers group, where he led Citi’s global coverage of private equity funds, sovereign wealth and pension funds (“SWFs”), family offices and other alternative asset managers. During his time at Citi, he continuously served as Global Head of Citi’s practice with SWFs, completed a number of landmark transactions in the sector and built it into an industry leading franchise. Mr. Ahmad also served as Global Head of Citi’s Public Sector Group, which managed the firm’s relationships with government and multilateral clients across the globe and, in particular, worked with a number of countries in assisting them in their economic diversification and FDI promotion strategies. In all of his activities, he was actively engaged across many countries in the MENA region and was a frequent visitor there as well. Mr. Ahmad was also the Chief Operating Officer of the Global Corporate and Investment Banking division, and served on several of Citi’s senior management committees and also represented Citi on a number of external Boards.

Before Citi, Mr. Ahmad held a number of other senior roles, including serving as Vice Chairman and Head of Corporate Finance – Americas for Standard Chartered Bank; Vice Chairman at J.P. Morgan Securities, Inc. where he served both as Chief Operating Officer – Americas Investment Banking as well as a senior member of the Financial Sponsor coverage group; Managing Director in both the Global Corporate Finance and Financial Sponsor/Leveraged Finance groups at Credit Suisse; Director and Head of Capital Markets at Wasserstein Perella & Co.; and Vice President at Drexel Burnham & Lambert.

In addition to his activities at Caravanserai, Mr. Ahmad is also a member of the Board of Directors of Sealed Air Corporation (NYSE: SEE), a leading global provider of food safety and security and product protection solutions and equipment, serves on both the Audit Committee and the Nominating & Corporate Governance Committees. Since leaving Citi in early 2017, Mr. Ahmad has also served as a Senior Advisor to a number of asset managers, including (a) CPP Investments, a global investment organization that invests the assets of Canada Pension Plan (AUM of ≈C$575 billion+), (b) Actis, an Emerging Markets focused alternative asset manager (AUM of ≈US$12.5 billion+), and (c) Muzinich & Co, a corporate credit manager (AUM of ≈US$35 billion+). Mr. Ahmad received his BSBA from Georgetown University and his MBA from the Harvard Business School. He has been a regular attendee at the Annual Meetings of the World Economic Forum, the IMF/World Bank, Milken Institute as well as the International Forum of Sovereign Wealth Funds.