Abdullah Safi

Senior Business Development and Sales Leader with 20+ years of experience driving international market expansion, P&L ownership, and strategic growth within the IT, cloud, and technology sectors. Proven expertise in scaling nearshore operations, building high-performing technical teams, and securing multi-million-dollar enterprise contracts across EMEA, MENA, and APAC. Multilingual (English, French, Turkish, Arabic) executive adept at forging long-term client portfolios, leading IT consulting service models, and steering cross-border commercial execution.

Based in Porto, Portugal.

General Manager at ERB / ERUS (2025-09 – 2026-09)

General Manager with full P&L accountability for a 300+ person organization, reporting to the Board on financial forecasts, risk, business health, and growth initiatives. Reframe the role around commercial leadership, margin improvement, and decision-making at board level.

MENA Region Sales Director at Kartaca (2022-12 – 2025-08)

MENA Region Sales Director at a Google Cloud Premier Partner, accountable for building the commercial organization, defining go-to-market plans, and driving regional expansion across KSA, UAE, Qatar, and Kuwait. Emphasize market-entry leadership, partner development, and sales organization build-out.

• Successfully expanded business to the region especially in KSA, UAE, Qatar and Kuwait.
• Lead the growth with new partnerships and created value.
• Leading highly talented and skilled hybrid team (multi-region, remote and in office), and facilitating individual growth to motivate and ensure to keep the pace for sales targets.

Cloud Sales Director at Kartaca – Google Cloud Platform (2020-12 – 2022-12)

Cloud Sales Director responsible for cloud sales strategy, team leadership, and go-to-market execution for Google Cloud Platform offerings. Frame this role around sales leadership, technical-to-commercial translation, and revenue growth from cloud and modernization opportunities.

• Complex hybrid cloud, digital transformation, application modernization, infrastructure modernization and migration projects.
• Partnered closely with elite technical and engineering specialists, enabling them with commercial frameworks and pricing strategies.
• Leading highly talented and skilled team, and facilitating individual growth to motivate and ensure to keep the pace for sales targets.

International Business Dev. and Sales Director at Havelsan (2019-07 – 2020-09)

International Business Development and Sales Director focused on expanding business across 32 countries, building partner relationships, and leading multi-region collaboration. Center the description on market expansion, stakeholder management, and revenue growth across ICT markets.

• Successfully expanded business to 32 different countries through new business opportunities.
• Formed a deliberate collaboration with Telco operators in APAC and MEA.
• Efficiently expand business by leading liaising on with multinational teams of 5 different regions to generate business revenue in ICT market.

ISV/OEM EMEA Senior Account Manager at Oracle Corporation (2016-11 – 2019-06)

ISV/OEM EMEA Senior Account Manager covering client accounts, budgets, and cloud-based revenue generation across ECEMEA. Reposition the role toward account growth, partner selling, and commercial ownership rather than task execution.

• Generated $2M revenue in FY/19 from cloud base software developing and selling.
• Piloted hiring of cloud base ISV services from competitors thus lowering marketing competition.

North Africa Sales Manager at Netaş Telekomünikasyon A.Ş. (2014-05 – 2016-11)

North Africa Sales Manager leading sales strategy, vendor relationships, and major accounts across the region. Position this as a market-building role with enterprise clients, contract wins, and complex delivery ownership

• Drove growth of organization by enhancing vendor relations and handling major accounts such as Algeria Ministry of Defence, Algeria Telecom Mobilis, OTA Djezzy, Sonatrach, Maroc Telecom etc. strategically.
• Pioneered success in two years by signing two contracts for more than $120 million.
• Delivered highly complex projects containing hardware, software, field work responsibilities, vendor management and partner management.

Executive Committee Member – Head of Sales and Marketing, Direct Sales at Elkotek A.S. (2012-01 – 2014-01)

Group Manager at Elkotek A.S. (2008-08 – 2012-01)

Channel Sales Group Manager at Elkotek A.S. (2005-01 – 2007-08)

Algeria Country Sales Manager at Hayat Kimya A.S. (2004-02 – 2005-01)

Regional Sales Manager (MENA) at Akmaya (2001-03 – 2003-06)

Bachelor in Business Administration – Istanbul Bilgi University, Istanbul, Turkey (2004)