A former investment banker, Ahmad brings two decades of experience working in and on behalf of businesses, social enterprises and government, including as the lead advisor on finance and economic policy to Sen. Dianne Feinstein on Capitol Hill.
He is the CEO of the Silicon Valley Leadership Group (SVLG), one of the nation’s most dynamic business associations representing the global technology companies that drive the innovation economy and its ecosystem.
He has a cross-functional skill set grounded in finance, growth, strategy, business development, public policy, and communications, with a working knowledge of stakeholder capitalism principles.
Ahmad is the founder of the Institute for California AI Policy (I-CAP), helping shape the regulatory posture needed to support AI’s development and deployment. And, he has implemented SVLG’s partnership with leading Silicon Valley companies and historically Black colleges and universities to diversify STEM talent pipelines.
Before SVLG, he was an investment banker at Barclays, specializing in structuring and financing public infrastructure, social impact and development projects, and managing over $15 billion in debt financings. He led banking teams and public sector coverage of social impact engagements in the Western United States. He also served on the firm’s Social Innovation Facility, aligning internal investments with social and environmental impact.
He serves on boards for the Bay Area Host Committee, California Partners Project, HealthRIGHT 360, Housing Trust Silicon Valley, NOLS (National Outdoor Leadership School), Symphony San Jose, and the SVLG Foundation. Named a 2023 Top 50 Diverse Board Candidate by the Nasdaq Center for Board Excellence and Equilar, he is an American Leadership Forum senior fellow and a member of the Silicon Valley Business Journal’s Power 100.
Ahmad holds a B.S. from Cornell University, a master’s from the London School of Economics and Political Science, and an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania.