A visionary in its true sense, Rizwan Sajan is a business leader who raised his business empire from a two-member husband-wife team way back in 1993 to a multi-billion-dollar sustainable diversified business conglomerate with 9 businesses spread across 50 locations in 10 countries employing more than 3,600 people.
Ranked 7th among the ‘Top 100 Indian leaders in the UAE’ List by Forbes Middle East, as well as all other media, Rizwan Sajan is one of the most prominent UAE businessmen, who is a strong voice of the private sector and an advocate of the UAE’s economy. He has been on the Forbes Middle East list for the sixth consecutive time. With multiple awards to the company’s credit, including the prestigious Dubai Quality Awards, and MRM Business Awards, the company has created a benchmark point of reference for success amid challenges for others to follow.
He has transformed a building materials trade — a very traditional business — into a popular household brand and has paved way for the strongest conglomerate brand in the GCC, reflecting his acumen in marketing and branding.
Danube Group owns a number of companies namely:
* Danube Building Materials — its flagship business with 25,000 types of building materials under one roof.
* Danube Home, its home-furnishing division.
* Danube Properties — its real estate development division.
* Milano, an Italian bath and bathroom solutions provider.
* Alucopanel an American aluminium composite panel division.
* Danube Hospitality Solutions, it’s turnkey hotel solution provider division.
* American Aesthetic Medical Centre which is a holistic aesthetic laser clinic for skin and hair.
* Starz Media which is the Publishing division of the brand and carry’s the famous Filmfare brand in the Mena region.
* Danube Home and Danube Home Express are the franchise business models in West Africa and CIS countries. The Group’s annual turnover has been estimated to be over 1.5 Billion USD.
Over the course of the last 28 years, his company has grown from strength to strength amid multiple regional conflicts, wars, and economic and financial crises including the Gulf War, Global Financial Crisis of 10–2008, Arab Spring in 2012–2011 as well as global health crises including SARS, H1N1 Bird Flu and the latest COVID19- global pandemic, making it the most resilient business in the GCC region.
As a businessman, Sajan is known for picking up the best people, training them, empowering them, monitoring them and creating a fool-proof enabling system to help the business grow — to ensure success. Today, he remains a relaxed businessman while his people and processes deliver good results year after year, even in crises and pandemics — making it a good case study for business management students.
Despite running such a large group of businesses, Rizwan Sajan remains a family man, enjoying his life, and meeting with family friends — always wearing a smile. His mantra is to be happy and make others happy — his family, friends, colleagues, customers and other stakeholders.
