SV: Well I was actually in India, and I was introduced to IDP, owned (back then) by Australian universities. They recruited students for Australia. My logic to them was that they should have an office in the Gulf, simply because then – and even now – any boy who reaches the age of 18 and is an expatriate has to leave the country, he cannot stay in the country at all unless he is sponsored by an educational institution, that is the case even now.

My son is a case in point; the day he finishes high school, he’ll be 18, he has only two choices; either he enrols in a local university or he starts work, if he wants to live in the country [Dubai]. Now most people don’t want to do this, and in those days there were few education options. You didn’t have any of the Heriot-Watts or any of the universities you see now [at DIAC].

The PIE: So overseas education was an obvious option to young expatriates…

SV: Yes. Most of these kids didn’t want to go home because for them home was as alien to them as to another foreigner. Because they were born here in Dubai, they lived here, so they were quite uncomfortable going home, home being India, Pakistan, Lebanon, Egypt, Jordan. So that was the reason we said ok let’s tap this market, the expatriate market.

“We had this critical mass of people who were high achievers and were wanting to study and could not get into any decent university back home in India or wherever”

In those days, I’m not sure if you remember the Aussie dollar was less than 50 cents to the US dollar so, studying in Australia was very very economical and in a competitive position; it wasn’t as expensive as it is today; it was less that half the price of  anywhere else in the world. So we had this critical mass of people who were high achievers and were wanting to study and could not get into any decent university back home in India or wherever it is and they were looking for an alternative, So we introduced Australia to them. We did very well.

The PIE: How did you launch the first office?

We had our first office in Dubai, and initially what we really did was go to the schools, have help desks, have totally dedicated Aussie roadshows. Only people who wanted to go to Australia would come to the roadshow!

The PIE: And was Australia already known then as an Australian education…

SV: Oh no not at all, nobody knew Australia in fact they kept mistaking it for Austria! They kept saying but Europe is only three hours away. Nobody knew Australia and nobody from Australia knew the Middle East either so I think it was a quid pro quo.

The PIE: How did you meet IDP?

SV: I was introduced to IDP through a very close friend of mine who was running IDP in India.

So we started IDP in 1999/2000 and it did very well but then 9/11 happened, so obviously everyone was looking for an alternative to the USA…

“The sponsored do what I call the full Monty, English language, pathways and academics so from a commercial point of view they were very good for us”

And somewhere down the road we changed direction, and instead of focusing on the expatriates and I started focusing on the nationals. Eventually it becomes a number game and I decided if you want to do well you have to have nationals on board, but they are sponsored [by government]. I would reckon about 90% of them are sponsored, by government or a third party – it could be a bank or it could be a ministry. The sponsored do what I call the full Monty, English language, pathways and academics so from a commercial point of view they were very good for us; the yields per student were a lot higher.

Even then I used to tell everybody, I said 9/11 came and one day it will pass, and these guys would go back to America and the UK but nobody could see that because everyone was wanting to go to Australia.

I remember when we started off less than 250 students had been to Australia, and when I quit IDP in 2008 we had about 5000 or 6000 students running about in Australia.

The PIE: Per year?

“When I quit IDP in 2008 we had about 5000 or 6000 students running about in Australia”

SV: Yeah! Like I said we were fortuitious because of 9/11 then a lot of marketing, the Aussies really know how to market international education which is great, unlike the Yanks who have absolutely no clue. So, it did very well but as I said I always believed that one day they would go back to America and to the UK and that’s exactly what’s happening now. So, I started my own company in 2008 called Intelligent Partners and we did focus on the UK and US –  that’s what we do.

The PIE: How did you build up your partners in those countries?