Bank Sarasin-Alpen (Qatar), a subsidiary of Swiss-based Bank Sarasin & Company, has strengthened its Qatar operations by hiring a private banking team for the Qatar office.

The Bank Sarasin-Alpen private banking team in Qatar will be headed by Sulaiman Yousif Salhi. He will be supported by Meenal Mahajan and Rasha Badawi in client relationship management roles.

The Qatar operations of Bank Sarasin-Alpen were launched in February 2008. This move has come in with the Bank’s aspirations to grow in Qatar and use it as a base to market in other GCC countries, said a top official.

“With the growing business opportunities in Qatar, it was very important that we bring in resources that can channel our operations in the right direction”, commented Rohit Walia, executive vice chairman and CEO of Bank Sarasin-Alpen (Qatar).

“We are confident that Sulaiman Yousif Salhi and the new team will play an important role in helping us further expand our business in Qatar. They bring with them great experience from the local Qatari market and are extremely familiar with the nuances of the region,” he said.

'The Middle East region is very important for us and as our operations are well established in Dubai, we are looking at the Qatar market for expansion and growth,' said Fidelis M Goetz, head of Private Banking Division, Bank Sarasin & Company, Switzerland and chairman of Bank Sarasin-Alpen (Qatar).

'We hope to grow in Qatar at a reasonable pace and carve a niche for ourselves in the private banking market of Qatar,' he added.

Sulaiman Yousif Salhi will have the key responsibility of leading the Qatar Private Banking Team as the senior executive officer. Sulaiman has over 19 years of work experience and joins us from HSBC, Qatar where he was the head of HSBC - Amanah.

Mahajan, with over 17 years of work experience, joins the bank from ICICI Bank- Qatar where her last position was as country head and assistant general manager.

Badawi joins the bank with over 13 years of work experience. Her last stint was with Standard Chartered Bank where she was the head of Wealth Management & Shared Distribution. Prior to that she worked for 10 years with HSBC Qatar-TradeArabia News Service