Ahmed Abbas

Ahmed Abbas speaking at Abu Dhabi Media Summit 2014 about digital media and AlBernameg by Bassem Youssef
Full Name Ahmed Abbas
Birth Date October 30, 1981
Place of Birth Berlin, Germany
Nationality Egyptian
Occupation COO of Qsoft
Founder and CEO of DigiSay
Years Active 1999-present
Notable Works AlBernameg with Bassem Youssef
America Bel Arabi
DigiSay
YouTube Channels Awakening Records
Amr Diab
Mobinil

Ahmed Abbas (Arabic: أحمد عباس‎; born October 30, 1981 in Berlin) is an Egyptian digital media expert who is also the CEO and founder of DigiSay, one of the first digital media agencies to be part of the YouTube partnership program in the MENA region. He is also the COO of Qsoft Holding, an Egyptian digital media production company, best known for creating the world renowned political satire show Al-Bernameg with Bassem Youssef, where he also acted as the project director of the show.[1]

Early life

Abbas was born in 1981 in Berlin, Germany and spent his childhood years between Cairo, Egypt and Vienna, Austria. He moved back to Egypt where he attended a German School in Cairo (Deutsche Evangelische Oberschule).

Career

Abbas graduated from Helwan University, with a Bachelor’s degree in German Tour Guidance. Right after graduation he started working as a Marketing Executive for Raya Holding, a leading investment conglomerate in Egypt. He later joined TBWA, a global advertising network where he started working on marketing communications and PR projects for several brands including Mars, Motorola, Henkel and Nissan. In 2007 Abbas was awarded a scholarship by the German Academic Exchange Service or DAAD to study for an MBA degree at the European School of Business The ESB Business School in Germany. After completing his MBA he served as EMEA Marketing Manager at NetApp, a leading vendor of innovative storage and data management solutions that help organizations around the world store, manage, protect, and retain their data. In 2010, Abbas founded DigiSay, one of the first digital media agencies to be part of the YouTube partnership program. [2][3]

Developing Al-Bernameg and managing Bassem Youssef

Following the tremendous success of the B+ Show on YouTube and the first season of Al-Bernameg on ONTV Tarek ElKazzaz, the creator of the show, convinced Abbas to join QSoft as Chief Operations Officer and Project Director for Al-Bernameg with the mission of developing and upgrading the show into a multifaceted and global brand. Abbas developed a fully-fledged professional team for the management and the development of both Bassem Youssef and Al-Bernameg show on all levels, including marketing, operations, and public relations. He also acted as the main catalyst in bringing the show forward to international TV screens such as Deutsche Welle, which purchased the re-run airing rights for its third season. Abbas has also helped in developing and executing other TV productions such as “America in Arabic” or "America Bel Arabi" show, which was also presented by Bassem Youssef and shot in the USA. The show was aired on OSN Network and Alnahar TV Network in the Middle East with its re-run airing rights sold to Al-Hurra network.[4]

DigiSay

Realizing the global potential and growth of online video distribution and development, in 2010 Abbas founded DigiSay, one of the first digital media agencies to be part of the YouTube partnership program in the MENA region. Today, DigiSay manages the YouTube presence of some of the biggest names on the Egyptian market including Amr Diab, Awakening Records, MobiNil and many others being one of the leading multi-channel and platform networks with a team of YouTube certified experts. Abbas has been a YouTube content partner since 2010 and is one of the first YouTube certified experts worldwide. To date, DigiSay has launched over 200 YouTube channels all over the world and generated about 3.3 billion views. The company also partnered up with other video platforms such as Vuclip and Dailymotion to broaden its horizon in online video distribution. Abbas has also contributed to online copyright protection by educating and training the first group of YouTube Partners in Egypt.[5][6] Given his background and experience Abbas has been invited to attend and speak at number of international and regional media events including SXSW 2013, Deutsche Welle Global Media Forum 2014, MIPTV 2015, Digital Entertainment World 2015, IBC Content Everywhere MENA 2014, Abu Dhabi Media Summit 2014 and ArabNet Beirut 2015.[7][8][9][10][11][12]

References

  1. ↑ http://www.zoominfo.com/p/Ahmed-Abbas/1971616800
  2. ↑ https://ae.linkedin.com/in/abbasnt
  3. ↑ https://www.xing.com/profile/Ahmed_Abbas5
  4. ↑ http://www.dw.de/abbas-ahmad/a-17596874
  5. ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/6145905?hl=en
  6. ↑ http://www.youm7.com/story/2011/8/27/%D8%A5%D9%81%D8%B7%D8%A7%D8%B1_%D8%AC%D9%88%D8%AC%D9%84_%D9%8A%D8%AC%D9%85%D8%B9_%D8%B4%D8%B1%D9%83%D8%A7%D8%A1_%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%80_%D9%8A%D9%88%D8%AA%D9%8A%D9%88%D8%A8__%D9%81%D9%89_%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B4%D8%B1%D9%82_%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%A3%D9%88%D8%B3%D8%B7/481741#.VEOZW0saW18
  7. ↑ http://www.my-mip.com/en/Contributors/582075/Abbas-Ahmed
  8. ↑ http://www.admediasummit.com/en/the-event/speakers/2014/Ahmed-Abbas
  9. ↑ https://www.arabnet.me/conference/beirut/speakers/
  10. ↑ http://www.ibcce.org/page.cfm/Action=Visitor/VisitorID=2492/loadSearch=179570_1533
  11. ↑ http://www.dewexpo.com/speakers/
  12. ↑ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_multi-channel_networks#Based_elsewhere_in_the_world