15 December 2017 Press Release

Zubin Karkaria wins 'CEO of the Year' at the Masala! Awards 2017

DUBAI: Zubin Karkaria, CEO of VFS Global, the world's largest outsourcing and technology services specialist for governments and diplomatic missions worldwide, has been named the CEO of the Year at the Masala! Awards 2017. The prestigious accolade was awarded in recognition of his outstanding performance as CEO of VFS Global. Organised by ITP Publishing and held in conjunction with the popular Asian magazine Masala!, this year's awards were the programme's tenth edition, with the ceremony held on 13 December 2017 at the Parks, Dubai Parks and Resort.

Masala! Awards are recognised as the biggest Asian Awards in the region and honours the most talented people in the field of business, philanthropy, fashion, lifestyle and arts. This year, the red- carpet gala dinner was attended by Bollywood A-listers including Kapoor, , Manish Malhotra, Govinda and Pakistani powerhouses Mahira Khan, Saba Qamar and Mawra Hocane. The evening was hosted by and Salman Qureshi.

"I am deeply honoured to receive this award and extend my sincere gratitude to the organizers of the Masala! Awards. I also take the opportunity to thank our dynamic and dedicated team at VFS Global, who work relentlessly to be the world’s leading visa, consular, identity and citizen services provider for governments, organizations and consumers", commented Zubin Karkaria on receiving the award.

With a rich experience of close to 30 years in the travel business and in developing a truly global business, Zubin has taken-on and overcome several challenges successfully. His success lies in his sharp entrepreneurial sense combined with organisation building skills. Zubin’s greatest achievement has been the conceptualisation and the outstanding success of VFS Global. He was primarily responsible for launching the business in 2001 to serve one client government with three application centres in Western India, and growing it into a world leader in its space serving 57 client governments with over 2,400 application centres across 130 countries.

The company has handled over 160 million applications since its inception in 2001. In addition to this, Zubin is the CEO of VFS Global's parent company, Swiss based Kuoni Travel Management Ltd. (Kuoni Group) since 2015.

About VFS Global

VFS Global is the world's largest outsourcing and technology services specialist for governments and diplomatic missions worldwide. With 2453 Application Centres, operations in 130 countries across five continents and over 160 million applications processed as on 30 November 2017, VFS Global serves the interests of 57 client governments. VFS Global’s worldwide operations are certified ISO 9001:2008 for Quality Management System, ISO 27001:2013 for Information Security Management System and ISO 14001:2004 for Environmental Management System. For more information, please visit www.vfsglobal.com

Media Contact Shaily Vaswani [email protected] VFS Global