Zayed Al Zayani is a dynamic and shrewd businessman and, at 35, is the youngest son of Rashid Al Zayani, a name synonymous with business enterprises in Bahrain for more than a century. Zayed's three elder brothers founded Al Zayani Investments in 1977; and after Majid's sudden death in 1980, Khalid and Hamed ran it jointly until 15 years ago when Zayed graduated from the University of Bahrain.

"I learnt the ropes for a year before going on to do an MBA in finance at Boston University and re-joined the company in 1992," Zayed explains. "Because of my financial background, my brothers asked me to do an in-depth study of the company to see where we should focus our strengths over the next 10 years. 

"Assisted by our auditors, Ernst and Young, we devised a simple strategy: stick to what we do best. If we're not in the top three of any business, then we don't want to be in it. We reshuffled all our resources and categorised all our companies into core and non-core, then retained and reinforced the core businesses and got rid of the others," Zayed continues. 

"By the turn of this century, we'd cleared our books. Our master plan was to grow vertically rather than horizontally. We expanded within the core structures concentrating on our automotive and aluminium fields and left other business opportunities to those who do it better," he says. 

But the icing on the cake for Zayani Motors has been their recent appointment as the Mitsubishi distributors for Iraq, known as Al Rasheed Holdings, due to become operational this month. "This is an important step for us," Zayed points out. "We were fortunate to win this race, having been selected out of 200 candidates worldwide. 

"It's a fantastic opportunity and also underlines our success in Bahrain." The first consignment of cars arrived in May, delivered to a brand-new showroom in Baghdad.

"We plan to expand into Basra and Mosul within the year, and we've already received requests for local sub-dealerships. People still have to get around," Zayed underlines when asked if the ongoing troubles in Iraq will affect business. 

"Iraq is the size of the GCC states with a population of 25 million. It's a rich country, the people are well educated, and although they've suffered under sanctions for many years, they still need a car to drive. I reckon that Iraq will equal the boom of the Arabian Gulf in the 1970s, with everyone scrambling for market share," he predicts. 

"We'll stick to our basic strategy of investing and expanding within our core businesses - but outside Bahrain. The first is in Iraq." As if he didn't have enough to keep him busy, Zayed is also on the board of the Bahrain International Circuit (BIC). 

"It was an honour and a privilege," he stresses, "to have been so closely involved with Bahrain's first hosting of Formula One in the Middle East, which was more successful than we could ever have hoped for. All participants including teams, drivers and Bernie Ecclestone praised Bahrain for having pulled off such a prestigious event, which shows the world that Bahrain can do anything. 

"We scored high marks but let's not slip back," Zayed cautions. "Bahrain needs to have at least four international events a year of this magnitude. We mustn't try to compete with Dubai. 

"We don't have the space or the resources. If Dubai is Ibiza, Bahrain is Monaco. We should trade off on quality where one visitor will spend as much in Bahrain as 20 will in Dubai." 

Hosting F1 has paved the way for an exciting new venture in Bahrain whereby Euromotors has been appointed by BMW Motor Sports to set up the world's first endorsed driver-training and racing school. Based on the success of the Bahrain school, BMW will open other centres worldwide, confirms Zayed. 

He plans to involve all GCC states in this project, which ultimately aims to produce the Middle East's first F1 driver as well as working jointly to attract the best of motor sports to the region. Paul Spooner, chief instructor for the project, will manage the business to operate Formula BMW cars, similar to those that ran the support race on Grand Prix day in Bahrain.