US private equity company General Atlantic sets up Abu Dhabi base to boost investments

ADGM office is the company's second in the Middle East in less than two months, underpinning growth prospects in the wider region

ADGM building, Al Maryah Island. General Atlantic is the latest among global investors to set up a base in Abu Dhabi's financial hub. Ruel Pableo for The National

General Atlantic is opening a new office in Abu Dhabi, the second outpost for the US-based private equity company in the Middle East in less than two months as it aims to build on its $1 billion of investments in the region.

The new base of operations at Abu Dhabi Global Market comes after the company’s announcement at the end of October to establish its presence in the Saudi capital Riyadh.

The latest move of the company with about $100 billion in assets under management “reflects its commitment to partnering with investors and entrepreneurs” in the Arab world’s second-largest economy, the company said.

The expansion of the footprint in the broader Middle East North Africa and Turkey region also underpins its “conviction in attractive opportunities” that are available in fast-growing regional economies, it said.

General Atlantic is the latest among global financial institutions, asset managers, family offices as well as international funds and investors to set up a base in ADGM, one of the fastest-growing onshore financial hubs in the region.

Chicago-based Nuveen, which oversees about $1.2 trillion of AUMs, completed its registration with ADGM in September this year to capitalise on a rising affluent investor base in the UAE.

The 125-year-old company was the second asset manager with a 13-figure AUM to call Abu Dhabi home after PGIM, the global asset management business of Prudential Financial with $1.33 trillion in assets, opened its office earlier that month.

Last month, BlackRock, the world's biggest asset manager, also received a commercial licence to operate in Abu Dhabi.

The number of asset and fund managers operating within the jurisdiction reached 128 by the end of the third quarter, managing 156 funds. The AUMs of companies operating in the financial hub have tripled, with a 215 per cent annual increase in the three months, according to the latest ADGM data.

The New York-based General Atlantic, which invests in growth companies, said its Abu Dhabi office will play a vital role in accelerating its growth in the region and will allow partnerships and engagements with companies in the firm’s core investment strategies – technology, consumer, financial services, health care, and climate.

The company has been actively investing in the Middle East and North African region since 2012 and has so far invested over $1 billion in companies including eyewa, a regional eyewear retailer; Insider, an AI platform; Property Finder, an online real estate platform; and Trendyol, a regional e-commerce marketplace.

The company’s past investments include Yemeksepeti, an online food ordering marketplace, which was sold to Delivery Hero and Network International, a UAE-based payments solution provider.

The Menat remains a crucial plank of the company's global growth plans as economies in the Middle East alone are expected to grow by about 4 per cent in 2025 and 2026 and have the “potential to unlock around $1 trillion in additional GDP through greater economic diversification", the company said.

The region’s digital economy is also a significant driver of growth with the UAE’s digital economy projected to increase by $140 billion by 2031. The country has made significant investments in digital transformation across sectors that support the national goal of doubling the contribution of the digital economy to the UAE's non-oil GDP from to over 20 per cent within the next 10 years, it added.

Last year, General Atlantic named Samir Assaf as chairman of its Mena business to increase investment in the region.

Earlier this year, the company acquired sustainable investment firm Actis, which is also evaluating several deals in the Middle East, amid the region’s push for green energy and global hydrogen ambitions.

The pipeline of potential investment deals is growing for Actis in the region, its chairman Torbjorn Caesar, told The National in October.

“We are very active here and we're looking at deals in the region – power generation and distribution, district cooling and distributed generation, meaning solar rooftop type [assets] … we have more in the pipeline in these sectors, and we like them a lot,” he said.

“There are four active deals that we're looking at right now”, which the company expects to close next year, he added. He did not reveal the size or the investment value of the potential deals.