Dubai, UAE, 17 June 2015

RAK Ceramics, a global hi-tech manufacturer of premium lifestyle ceramics solutions with a turnover of one billion USD, further expands its management team with three new senior appointments, underlining its commitment to accelerate its growth momentum globally and reinforce the company with the best talent.

The new expanded management team will support the Value Creation Initiatives, adopted by the company in June 2014.

RAK Ceramics had announced in February 2015 the appointment of Stefan Schmied as President of Tiles and Sanitaryware and Raaqib Mutvalli as Head of the Performance Management Office.

The three new senior appointments are:

• George Rabahie – Chief Legal Counsel and Company Secretary:
  George has been appointed as the Chief Legal Counsel and Company Secretary at RAK Ceramics and will be working closely with the leadership team to manage all the legal and regulatory aspects of the business globally. George joins RAK Ceramics as a qualified lawyer, bringing with him 16 years of legal experience in the region, including 9 years in the UAE as Middle East Regional Counsel for a Fortune 100 Oil and Gas Services Company and Legal Director for an industry leader in food distribution and manufacturing. Fluent in Arabic, English, and French, George was admitted to the Beirut Bar Association in 1999.
• Rene Maan – Regional Vice President:
  Rene has been appointed as the Regional Vice President at RAK Ceramics, based in Europe, and will be working alongside the leadership team to accelerate strategic growth initiatives for the European business in cooperation with the current structure of Joint Venture partners. René joins RAK Ceramics with more than 20 years of international sales and marketing experience, successfully completing posts in the Netherlands, New Zealand, United States of America, Germany, and Singapore. Prior to RAK Ceramics, René served as Managing Director at Hydrostyle and Interior Affairs in Singapore and previously, Regional Vice President South East Asia and Pacific at GROHE Pacific in Singapore. René is fluent in Dutch, English, and German.
• Philippe Habeichi – Head of Investor Relations:
  Philippe has been appointed as the Head of Investor Relations and will be responsible for creating and communicating the company’s strategy and equity story with the investment community. Reporting directly to the Chief Executive Officer, Philippe joins RAK Ceramics with 15 years of equity research and analysis experience between Canada and the UAE. Prior to RAK Ceramics, he was the Senior Vice President of Institutional Equity Sales at Shuaa Capital and previously, worked at Citigroup and EFG Hermes. Philippe is fluent in French, English, and has working proficiency in Arabic.

Abdallah Massaad, Chief Executive Officer of RAK Ceramics, said: “It gives me great pleasure to welcome the three new senior hires who will be integral assets to our company as we continue implementing our new re-focused strategy. I look forward to working closely with them during a very important and exciting phase for our business’ development. We have merely scratched the surface in terms of the customers that we can attract, the innovations that we can implement and the sustainable growth that we can achieve. I am confident that we now have the right resources in the right place to not only solidify our organisational structure, but to also strengthen the implementation of our corporate strategy in terms of core-business focus.”