Nominations for the prestigious Asian Business Awards Middle East 2007 draw to a close

The announcement was made by Indian Expressions Marketing Consultancy FZE (Axis International Group) and Real Media FZLLC, the event architects and owners of the ABA ME 2007.

The ABA ME 2007, which was announced in September, is the first Asian Business Awards ever to be held in the Arab world and is established to recognize the achievements of Asian business leaders and entrepreneurs who have made an indelible mark on the business scene in the Middle East.

Al Barari, one of the UAE's leading luxury real estate developers, is the premier sponsor for ABA ME 2007 while PricewaterhouseCoopers, the world's leading business advisory services, are its official and independent analysts.

Commenting on the nominations process, Nitin Khanna of PricewaterhouseCoopers said, "The ABA ME award criteria were defined on the basis that achievement should be measured in a holistic sense and should not be limited to job and wealth creation, important as they both are.

Therefore, the organisers created a criteria pyramid for judging a businessperson's eligibility for the various awards. At the base of the pyramid were the fundamental criteria such as commitment to quality, people management, environment and culture in the ME region. The second block of the pyramid dealt with business performance indicators such as leadership, financial performance, innovation and social responsibility. At the top of the pyramid were achievement differentiators, the more intangible criteria, such as personality, contribution to positive change, global presence etc."

He added, "To sum up, commercial performance was only one of several criteria that was considered when evaluating a nominee's eligibility for the award. The public has responded very well to this holistic framework for choosing nominees".

Over the past month, the public has voted for the following six Award categories:

1.Outstanding Asian Business Man of the Year
2.Outstanding Asian Business Woman of the Year
3.Asian Rising Star of the Year
4.Young Asian Achiever of the Year
5.Outstanding contribution to Middle East Development Award
6.Asian Business Leader of the Year

The list of nominees from the me includes some of the most prominent business personalities from the United Arab Emirates.

At 10am on 1st November 2007, Nominations for the ABA ME 2007 will close. Subsequently, a high-profile jury panel will take a decision on selecting the three final Nominees in each of the six categories. The jury panel consists of Michael J Stevenson, Senior Partner Middle East Region, PricewaterhouseCoopers; Abdulaziz Sager, Chairman, Gulf Research Centre, and President of Sager Group Holding in Saudi Arabia; Alexander John Andrakis, Executive Director, Sales & Marketing, Emaar Properties; and Sultan Saoud Al Qassemi, Managing Director of the Al-Qassemi group of companies and Chairman of Barjeel Securities.

On November 9th, the names and profiles of the eighteen finalist nominees will be announced by the Ambassador of India to the United Arab Emirates, His Excellency, Mr. Talmiz Ahmad. Thereafter, the awards will enter the exciting phase of polling with heightened competition between the 18 finalists. Once again, the public will be invited to use the ABA website to make the final choice from amongst the contenders from each category.