BrazilGrant Thornton Bahrain appoints Navneet Sharma as Director of IT Advisory
Grant Thornton in Bahrain has brought seasoned tech and business consultant Navneet Sharma aboard as its new Director for IT Advisory Services.
Joining Grant Thornton Abdulaal following a three-year stint as Senior Manager in fellow global consulting firm Protiviti’s Manama office, Sharma will in his new Director role work with senior management clients in evaluating, implementing, operating and monitoring technology in areas such as digital transformations, cloud and mobility strategies and the creation of secure solution architecture that meets their business transition, security and compliance needs.
With over a decade and half experience in various areas of IT and business advisory, and previous completed assignments in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, UK, Germany, India and Africa, Sharma prior to crossing from Protiviti worked in a series of senior management roles for a number of telcos, including Libya Africa Investment Portfolio’s LAP GreenN, Afghanistan's leading telecommunications provider, Roshan, and the Kenyan division of India’s Airtel – before which he served as a Principal Technology Consultant for PwC in New Dehli.
“GTA management welcomes Navneet on board and wishes him good luck and success in this new journey,” the local firm said in a statement, while its Managing Partner Jassim Abdulaal – a 23-year assurance and business advisory veteran with stints as an Audit Partner for BDO and Director with PwC under his belt – told the Gulf Daily News that Sharma’s appointment reflected Bahrain’s progress toward establishing itself a regional MENA tech hub with a particular focus on fintech, blockchain, cloud, and cybersecurity services.
“Fintech as the confluence of financial services and technology offers individuals as well as small, medium and large corporates opportunities to innovate and deliver services more efficiently and economically,” Abdulaal said. “We believe that technology like mobile wallets will contribute positively to converting society to be less dependent on cash, it will also contribute to promoting financial inclusion, putting Bahrain at the forefront of the fintech revolution.”
Sharma, fresh in his new role, added; “Innovations in fintech have a clear potential to disrupt how the financial sector will operate in the future, creating many opportunities to invent new products and services that can meet the rapidly changing needs of consumers, whether that is enabling people to pay for goods in shops using their phones, providing greater convenience through fingerprint, or any of the many innovations in the region that businesses are exploring.”
The recruitment news follows the local firm’s recent celebration of its successful growth over the past decade, emerging as one of the leading audit and advisory entities in the Kingdom. “Grant Thornton Abdulaal has exhibited exponential growth in the past decade, growing from seven employees and 70 clients in 2006 to 100 employees and more than 1,200 clients at present.” Abdulaal said. Globally, the Grant Thornton International network has a headcount of over 50,000 operating across 136 countries – with revenues last year topping $5 billion.
In other recent local appointment news, Aluminium Bahrain has named the founder and Managing Partner of Istishara Consulting, Adnan Hashim, as its new Chief Financial Officer
