Can you talk about this, and why do you think this model helped it, this having more Egyptians involved, helped this initiative to be a success?

Yeah.

So just to take a step back, the earlier enterprise funds in Eastern and Central Europe that I mentioned in the previous question, they primarily relied on putting American investment professionals on the ground to help stimulate and invest in private sector investments.

development in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

In the case of the Egyptian American Enterprise Fund, it was a bit different.

I mean, one of the most important takeaways of the book and probably the biggest lesson learned that our chairman, Jim Harmon, always conveys is that he had to rely on local Egyptian investment talent to really stand up the fund.

And that's because as we described in chapter one, on his first trip to Cairo, In September 2012, Egypt was in crisis.

But then I'll ask you the second part later on.

Can you talk about this, and why do you think this model helped it, this having more Egyptians involved, helped this initiative to be a success?

Yeah, so just to take a step back, the earlier enterprise funds in Eastern and Central Europe that I mentioned in the previous question, they primarily relied on putting American investment professionals on the ground to help stimulate and invest in private sector development in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

In the case of the Egyptian American Enterprise Fund, it was a bit different.

I mean, one of the most important takeaways of the book and probably the biggest lesson learned that our chairman, Jim Harmon, always conveys is that he had to rely on local Egyptian investment talent to really stand up the fund.

And that's because, as we described in Chapter 1, on his first trip to Cairo, In September 2012, Egypt was in crisis.

Foreign investors had fled.

Tourism was collapsing.

But then I'll ask you the second part later on.

Can you talk about this, and why do you think this model helped it? This having more, um, Egyptians involved helped this, uh, initiative to be a success?

Yeah.

So just to take a step back, um, the earlier enterprise funds in Eastern and Central Europe, um, that I mentioned in, in the previous, uh, question, uh, they primarily relied on putting American investment professionals on the ground to help stimulate and invest private, in private sector development in, in, in Eastern Europe and Central Asia.

In the case of the Egyptian American Enterprise Fund, it was a bit different.

I mean, one of the most important takeaways of the book, and probably the biggest lesson learned that our chairman, Jim Harmon, always conveys, is that he had to rely on local Egyptian investment talent, um, to really stand up the fund.

And that's because, as we describe in chapter one, on his first trip to Cairo in September 2012, Egypt was in crisis.

Foreign investors had fled.

Um, but then I'll ask you the second part later on.

So, like, could you kinda walk us through, like, your earlier, you know, i-idea of Egypt, what it was like, you know, in 2011 when the Arab Spring was happening, post-Arab Spring to what it's like now?

Sure.

Yeah, that's a great question.

Um, when I first arrived, I didn't know what to expect.

Obviously, you know, you have, um, preconceived notions of what the Middle East and, and the Arab world is like, especially, you know, coming from the United States as, as, as a, as a fresh college student, um, post 9/11.

Um, but that's why I showed up, is I wanted to experience something new.

I wanted to learn more about the people and, and experience, uh, the region and, and study the language.

Could you kind of talk about some of that?

'Cause I think it gives you a flavor of the reality, which was the fund's success was never guaranteed.

Yeah.

No, that's a great question, and I think it's important to, to, to just present the context that the Enterprise Fund was created in.

I mean, the Egyptian revolution was a historic people-led revolution, um, in Egypt.

Um, it had ousted a 30-year, uh, autocrat, Hosni Mubarak, who had been in power, um, for a significant period of time.

And the Enterprise Fund, um, was operating in a very fluid environment in which, um, Egypt was undergoing a profound political transition.

And there were concerns, um, from different elements of Egyptian society and the government that, um, maybe the US was meddling in Egyptian affairs, and there were concerns about the Obama administration's US-Egypt policy from not only folks in Egypt, but also Republicans in Congress.

So can you take us kinda from the inside, like, what happened at the beginning of 2025?

Connie, walk me through the logic behind backing managers like Lorax, TCV, Algebra Ventures, Flat Six Labs, which you just mentioned, and others, rather than investing directly in everything yourselves.

Sure.

Well, I think early on, based on Jim's experience arriving in Egypt in 2012 and experiencing some of the challenges that he faced politically on the ground, not only from our own government in the United States, but also challenges with the Egyptian government and what was a fluid operating environment.

He realized early on you couldn't put Americans on the ground in that kind of environment.

It really made sense to rely on local Egyptian business talent to help us invest in source investments.

And fortunately, Egypt, as you know, is a population of 100 million people.

It's right at the gateways of Africa, the Middle East and Europe.

Connie, would you say that this type of investment fund provides an alternative method of influence to that of China's investment method on one hand and Gulf capital on the other?

So Connie, you can take that question and then we'll share the questions back and forth.

Thanks, Jim.

And Paul, in Egypt, we've primarily made equity investments.

So we've taken small shares of companies through either majority or minority stakes and help them grow to the next level where they can either exit and sell to a regional investor or or have an IPO on the Egyptian Stock Exchange.

And so we've primarily invested in companies.

We haven't made loans.

It's been primarily a private equity and venture capital model.

So it could be the most important development in our foreign policy.