Startup Rising

But despite the Arab Spring, little has changed in the Middle East; two years later, Egypt and Tunisia continue to suffer repression and fixed elections, while Syria descends into civil war. Amidst the chaos, however, a quiet revolution has begun to emerge: entrepreneurship. As an entrepreneur who had invested in emerging markets around the world, Christopher Schroeder was curious but skeptical about the future of investing in the Arab world. He travelled to Egypt, Dubai, Amman, Beirut, Istanbul, and Damascus to meet with thousands of passionate and resourceful entrepreneurs, who were overcoming cultural and social barriers inherent to their worlds. Equally important, he saw major private equity firms and tech companies making significant bets on them.