Board of directors

Farhad Forbes represents the 2nd Generation of Forbes Marshall, responsible for the Industrial Process Automation and Control Group of the Company. He has been in the company since 1982. Forbes Marshall is one of India’s leading companies in the fields of Steam Engineering, Energy Conservation, Utilities Management, and Industrial Process Automation and Control. It employs over 1100 people and has Joint Ventures and alliances in Germany, the United Kingdom, Belgium and Japan.

A fourth-generation family business owner, leader and strategist, Alex is Chairman of Applerigg, a private, family-owned business built on the foundations of a financial services group established by his great-grandfather in 1903. Following his leadership of the sale of Provincial Insurance Group in 1994, Alex founded the first of the Applerigg group portfolio companies: Sandaire, an international multi-family investment office, later joined by Yealand Administration, a funds administration company; Mount Kendal, a real estate investment advisor; and Horizons, a contemporary network and learning environment for the leaders of tomorrow. He is a Non-Executive Director of his family’s investment holding company, as well as of several private companies. Alex is a Trustee of the Grosvenor Estate, and chairs the Grosvenor Pension Plan and Wheatsheaf Group. He is a member of the Board of the Family Business Network International, co-founded and is a Life President of the Institute for Family Business (UK) and has served as a Director of the Family Firm Institute Inc. He is a Trustee of the Francis C Scott Charitable Trust, a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and a Patron of Tomorrow’s Company. Alex graduated from Exeter College, Oxford with an MA in Philosophy, Politics & Economics and holds an MBA from IMD, Lausanne.

Alexis is the CEO of The Family Business Network (FBN), the world’s leading network bringing together over 4,000 business owning families  – 17,000 individual members including 6,400 Next-Generation members – in 32 chapters covering 65 countries.

Prior to FBN, Alexis held senior positions, including at Lhoist, Verlinvest, Armonea and IFC (World Bank Group). For 6 years, he was Chairman of the Board of ToolBox, supporting NGOs by offering professional consultancy.

He is member of the Board of Trusted Family, the leading governance platform for family offices and boards, of the Advisory Council of AITIA Institute in Singapore and of various cultural organizations.

He has recently been recognized as one of the Top 100 Family Influencers by a leading magazine.

A Belgian and Swiss citizen, Alexis holds a Master in Management Science from Solvay Business School, is an INSEAD IEP and IMD HPL Graduate.

Phone: +41 21 618 04 56
Email: alexis.duroydeblicquy@fbn-i.org

Philippe Grodner holds a MBA from Essec in France. He has been CEO and President of Simone Perele since 1978. Since 2016, he is member of the Board of METI, a French middle-sized companies syndicate, lobbying for legal and tax regulations. Since 2016, Philippe is President of FBN France.

Mark Oliver is Managing Director of ERCO GmbH. Representing the third generation of the family in the ERCO Managing Board, he is also a member of the supervisory board of Carpe Diem GBS mbH, an elderly care group in Germany, and his other family business. Mark Oliver holds a MA degree in History and Economics from University of Cologne and is a board member of the German FBN Chapter.

Günseli Ünlütürk is Chairman of the Board of Directors of Sun Tekstil's retail brand Jimmy Key; she is also serving on the Board of Directors of Sun Textile and Ekoten at Sun Group. As one of the founders of Sun Textile and Ekoten; she has served in different positions in the family business and played an active role in Sun Tekstil's growth journey since establishment in 1987.

Role within FBN-I

• SUN TEKSTIL, TURKEY, G1
• Founder members of TAIDER Family Business Association, member association of FBN-I. 
• Board member of TAIDER for 2017-2019 period and leader of Sustainability and Social Responsibility Committee.

In a business career spanning over 20 years, beginning as an M&A Analyst with Morgan Stanley, Omar has brought a unique skill set to his role as Group CEO of Alghanim Industries and Chairman of Gulf Bank.

During his 17-year tenure at Alghanim Industries, Omar grew a geographically diverse multi-business group fivefold. This growth was enabled by building a culture of meritocracy of people and creativity. The Harvard Business School even wrote a case study to showcase the company for MBA students. Omar’s distinctive management style was also successful at Gulf Bank, where in seven years, he doubled net profit with double-digit growth figures every year, making Gulf Bank one of the fastest-growing banks in the region.

Omar is co-founder and continues as a regional board member of INJAZ-AL ARAB, which has touched over 3 million youth in the region. He is also involved with the World Economic Forum as Chair of the MENA Regional Business Council (2014-2015), and Chair of the initiative, ‘A New Vision for Arab Employment’ (2014-present). Omar also sits on the Leadership Council at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Centre for Public Leadership (2018-present), Harvard Business School’s Board of Dean’s Advisor’s (2018-present), and Harvard Business School’s MENA Advisory Board (2015-present). In 2018 the Family Business Council – Gulf (FBCG) elected Omar as their chairman.

Omar Is soon to launch a new impact Investment vehicle. He believes very strongly that business cannot exist for the sole purpose of profit. As a responsible investor, he wants to combine financial performance with social commitments, to become a pioneer in quality of life investments. He sees it as a way of improving the lives of the people in the Gulf Region.

In 1997, Omar received a Bachelor of Science degree in Business Commerce from New York University’s Stern School of Business and has an MBA from the Harvard Business School (Class of 2002).

Mehrad is a 3rd generation member of an Iranian enterprising family.

Born in Vancouver, raised in Tehran, and having lived in London, Hong Kong, Dubai and Madrid over the past 17 years, Mehrad is a global citizen with a strong belief in the family institution.

Before founding his own social enterprise in the pet industry, Mehrad worked as a Project Manager at Julius Baer in Hong Kong & London, where he was involved in the international acquisition of Merrill Lynch IWM, and later as Business Development Manager for ACC Aviation in Dubai.

Mehrad is an avid snowboarder, and enjoys maintaining a balanced lifestyle via fitness, nutrition, meditation and an active social life. Most notably, he is an ardent dog-lover who enjoys parenting his 2-year old pup Meeko. In his free time, he organises dog-friendly events to raise money for dog rescue & rehoming charities.

He holds a BA (Hons) in Development Studies with Economics from the University of Westminster, an MSc in Development Studies from the London School of Economics (LSE) and an International MBA from IE Business School in Madrid.

Roles within FBN-I:               

• Member, Board of Directors
• President, NxG Leadership Team
• Ambassador & Former Chair, Entrepreneurs Community
• Member, Polaris Committee

 
Key Topics of interest:

• Social entrepreneurship
• The environment & sustainability
• Dogs & Innovations in the pet industry

Aleksi Arpiainen (M.Sc. Business law) is a third generation owner and, since 2018, the CEO of TT Gaskets in Tampere, Finland. The company specializes in industrial sealing solutions for customers primarily in the Nordic countries and Central Europe, but also in Asia and North and South America.

Aleksi has been a valued Member of the Board of the Finnish Family Firms Association since 2016. Beyond his board membership, his roles in our association include his chairmanship of our NxG Team 2016-18, of our Ethos task group 2017 and of our Education task group since 2018. Aleksi’s role in chairing the Ethos task group was pivotal. Without him the group’s report on how our association and its members need to think about their ‘raison-d’être’ and their relationships with stakeholders would not have been as clear, powerful and concise as the final product turned out to be.

Sach is a 5th generation member of a multi-generational family, with interests in leading global businesses, which began from modest origins in East Africa over a hundred years ago. The family‘s core focus has been on nurturing entrepreneurial talent. It seeks to identify a very specific breed of entrepreneur or entrepreneurial team and create the best environment for their entrepreneurial fire to flourish, by providing very patient capital, active strategic inputs, and broad operating latitude. In response to what he sees as a fundamental global pivot, Sach is working on a new initiative, Prasino Concepts, with other likeminded partners that seeks to create a new kind of platform to invest in this new world. Sach has also just co-founded a crypto art business, which by connecting real time human emotions to digital art, seeks to catalyze a major evolution in the crypto art world.

Sach also serves on the boards of the Harvard Club of Switzerland and the advisory boards of Katalysen & Partners, The Raba Partnership, Musha Ventures and Marcena Capital. A core part of the family’s philosophy is to deploy the majority of its wealth towards philanthropic and social causes. Its principal focus areas are education and healthcare in Africa.
Sach is actively working with other family members on institutionalizing the existing philanthropic initiatives to enable philanthropic and social endeavors as career paths for future generations of family members. Sach is a founding member of the Casa Laxmi Foundation (which is seeking to build a revolutionary new kind of boarding school), and currently sits on the boards of ERFIP, a spin out from the Rothschilds Foundation, the Family Enterprise Foundation, and Internews Europe.

Tommaso is part of one of the oldest family involved in business activities in Italy, having established their very first company back in the 16th century, now, since 1886, the family has mainly been involved in the financial sector.

Born in Milan in 1994 and raised in Biella, he holds both italian and swiss citizenship. He graduated in law from Università Cattolica - Milano, in January 2020.

He has been involved in the italian chapter of FBN (AIdAF) since 2015, having an official role within the local NextGen Committee since 2017.

In 2016, he spent six months in the United States, studying law at the University of Iowa College of Law. Tommaso has also been involved in the family no-profit foundation (Fondazione Sella ONLUS) since 2015.

A Colombian national born in 1958, Mrs. Gómez is a Business Manager graduated from the University of EAFIT in Medellín, Colombia, with an MBA in International Business from the University of San Francisco, California. Titled in Advanced Management Program from the Universidad de La Sabana in Bogotá, also took courses in Philosophy from the Universidad Javeriana in Bogotá. 

Mrs. Gómez is an experienced Board Member and Senior Executive of both publicly traded and privately held companies in Colombia. She has a strong entrepreneurial spirit having founded more than ten companies that have traded services and goods in Colombia and has built a few family holding companies for her family of origin and her own. 

Mónica María Gómez is a people driven director, who engages in skill development and accompanies their inner growth. Experienced in establishing strategy and corporate responsibility, she is committed with economic performance and corporate governance. She promotes changes, tackles complex situations, and fosters out of the box thinking.

Her core competences are Company Governance (Leadership, Board of Directors, Board Committees) Family Governance, Sales of Consumer Products and Multinational Management.

Francisca has more than a decade of FBN membership in FBN Brazil (family) and FBN Denmark (individual) and 5 years of active engagement in my local Danish FBN chapter board, lately as co-chairperson.

She is currently the only family member active in the family business, as the co-Chairman of the Board, and leads a control group comprised of two families and a PE fund. She is also Chair of the Family Owners Council, the most active organ in the family governance structure. And she is the co-Chairperson of the Danish FBN chapter. She is purpose-driven - be it within the business, in finding ways to move individuals and families forward, or in putting money at the service of the greater good - impact investing is also a big interest of hers.

2G, NWT Holding. Klára is a second-generation member of the NWT Holding which operates across many fieldsand industries ranging from renewable energy and agriculture to electric cars and realestate. Klára is an active member of both global and local FBN charter.Former NxGPresident for her local chapter. She has been part of the NxG International Leadership Teamfor over three years now.Experienced Consultant with a demonstrated history of working in the informationtechnology and services industry. Skilled in Journalism, Non-profit Volunteering,Management, Child Development, Working With Children, and Leadership.She has done herBachelor's degree focused in Business/Managerial Economics from King's College London.She has lived in the UK, Germany and Czech whilestudying and working and soon moving toCanada to finish her Master’s in Entrepreneurial Studies.

Mary Ann Tsao is currently the Chairwoman of the Tsao Family Office and a fourthgenerationsteward of a group of companies that started in shipping and led to theformation of the IMC Group. She is also a member of the FBN Asia board, joining her brother,Frederick Chavalit, in establishing the regional, non-profit association of family businessescommitted to business practices that serve as a model of sustainability. A Director from2008 to 2019, she recently rejoined the board in November 2022. She also chaired FBNA’sSingapore country committee during her previous term and is again its chair. Mary Annplayed an instrumental role in building FBNA, especially the Singapore community. Alignedto FBNI’s charter, the Tsao Family and its family office aim to deploy all the family’s assetsfor the public good through how they invest, operate its businesses and conducts itsphilanthropy. She is currently also the Vice Chair for the newly established Tsao familyfoundation.

Mary Ann has received numerous awards andaccolades, including the Public Service Medal,Public Service Star, and Public Service Star (Bar) from the government of Singapore. InSeptember 2022, she was also named by the UN as one of the first 50 Global Healthy Ageingpioneers, who worked to make the world a better place for older people.