By Nazneen Abbas, Founder, Ma’an

Families with wealth across borders are already used to complexity. They live with different legal systems, different inheritance regimes, and different tax realities, often all at once. That part is not new. What has changed is the speed at which the environment around those structures is moving. The geopolitical backdrop is no longer something families can treat as distant noise. It is beginning to alter the conditions in which wealth is held, transferred, and protected.

That is becoming visible in the questions families are now asking. Across the GCC, many who already have Wills, trusts, foundations, and succession structures in place are no longer asking whether they have planned. They are asking whether what they put in place still holds. The conversation is shifting away from documents and toward durability, resilience, and relevance over time.

The issue is not complexity, it is movement

Cross-border planning has always required care. What feels different now is the sense that the regulatory environment may be entering a period of faster movement. Tax agreements that were once taken as given could come under review. Reporting standards may tighten further.  Frameworks in some jurisdictions may no longer offer the same level of certainty that families have relied on.

That does not automatically make an existing plan ineffective. It does mean the assumptions on which it was built may no longer be fully reliable. A structure that made sense five or seven years ago may still be valid on paper, but it may now interact differently with another jurisdiction’s rules. That difference is where risk begins to accumulate.

Many families are not dealing with poor planning. They are dealing with planning built for a slower-moving environment. A framework can be professionally drafted and entirely appropriate for its time, yet still require review because the conditions around it have changed. The gap, in many cases, is one of timing rather than quality.

Families do not experience risk as corporations do

Public discussion around geopolitical risk is usually framed in corporate language – market access, supply chains, revenue exposure. But geopolitical literacy is no longer just a corporate issue.

The same forces that alter corporate decision-making also alter the legal and tax environment in which private wealth sits. The difference is that families encounter those forces at far more personal moments. A business responds through compliance and restructuring. A family may discover, during a bereavement or a generational transition, that a structure meant to preserve stability is now sitting between conflicting legal systems or newly expanded obligations. The cost of outdated planning is rarely just technical. It is emotional, and it often surfaces when a family is least equipped to navigate it.

What a meaningful review actually covers

Families and family offices in the GCC with assets or obligations across multiple jurisdictions need to review their planning as a connected system. The question is not whether the Will is signed or the foundation properly established. It is whether those elements continue to work together under current conditions.

Do existing Wills still align with the succession laws of each jurisdiction involved? Do trust or foundation structures still operate as intended alongside local inheritance frameworks, reporting obligations, and tax treatment? The review also needs to reach instruments often created with care and then left untouched. Private Placement Life Insurance (PPLI), for example, may still be appropriate, but its treatment can vary depending on where the family is resident, where beneficiaries sit, and how international agreements evolve. Dynasty Trusts and Irrevocable Life Insurance Trusts (ILITs), especially when governed by US law, deserve renewed scrutiny where family circumstances or legal interpretation have materially changed.

This is not about alarm. It is about alignment. Cross-border structures fail less often because a single instrument is flawed, and more often because the instruments stop speaking to one another.

The plan may hold. Does it still fit?

A plan can remain legally intact and still fall behind. Families change. Children grow up. New dependents enter the picture. Businesses expand into new jurisdictions. Property is acquired in places never part of the original conversation.

If a structure no longer reflects the family’s wishes, responsibilities, or values, it is no longer doing its full job. The real test is not whether it remains untouched, but whether it continues to reflect the life it is meant to support. That matters especially in this region, where families operate across borders almost by default.

The strongest plans are not always the most elaborate. They are the ones revisited honestly and adjusted before pressure forces the issue. Families often treat estate planning as something to complete and put away, which is understandable.

Cross-border wealth planning across jurisdictions cannot remain static. It requires ongoing stewardship. Families that pause to review their structures now are doing what good planning has always required: ensuring the framework continues to reflect not just the world it operates in, but the family it is there to serve.

Raising capital is never just about convincing investors that an idea is interesting but proving that it can survive pressure, attract a defined audience, and grow with discipline. The region’s startup ecosystem is maturing, with early 2026 data showing funding activity remaining steady, with $327 million deployed in February alone across 62 deals, reflecting strong investor appetite but also intense competition. For niche companies, capital is available, but it goes to businesses that can prove commercially valuable demand in their category. MAXION, a UAE-based platform empowering social connections, puts together five fundraising tips for niche businesses preparing to attract investor backing.

Start with proof, not pitch

Investors are naturally careful with niche ideas because they are harder to size, explain, and compare. Founders should prove demand through users, applications, retention, revenue, or repeat behaviour, while clearly defining the underserved market they are building for. They also need to show why customer behaviour, market gaps, or timing make the opportunity commercially urgent.

Defensibility is just as important. In a market where an app can be built quickly, investors need to understand what cannot be easily replicated, whether that is founder expertise, proprietary data, community trust, or a product model shaped by years of real customer behaviour. MAXION’s moat comes from its “cupid in the loop” approach, shaped by the founder’s nearly decade-long experience matchmaking the world’s top 1% and translating those learnings into a tech platform for a wider audience.

Educate the market on your niche

Niche businesses often need to help investors understand the category before they can evaluate the company. Founders should explain the problem why existing solutions fall short, and how the business creates a different measure of value. A strong fundraising story explains where the company overlaps with existing players, where it performs differently, and where it has the potential to outpace them. In a niche category, taste, trust, and execution can become as important as technology.

In social connection apps, for example, the market cannot be understood only through likes or matches. Stronger indicators may include in-person dates, event attendance, quality of introductions, and connections that develop into lasting relationships.

Build a strong community

In a crowded consumer market, attention is expensive. Investors want to see that customers are willing to apply, engage, attend, return, recommend, and stay. A clear path to customers should be built before the fundraising process begins. They also need to feel confident that founders know how to reach their audience and can break through the noise with a clear marketing strategy. For MAXION, this proof came from its matchmaking business, with a curated community of over 5,000 members, 32,000 on the waiting list, and $750K secured in early-stage funding.

Founders need to understand where their audience spends time, who influences them, how they communicate, and what makes them trust a new product. This may come through targeted events, private communities, member referrals, micro-influencers, or highly focused social campaigns.

Focus on outcomes, not features

A company cannot raise capital on a strong idea alone. For founders raising from venture capital, the business case should come before the mission. VCs need to see the scale of the opportunity, revenue logic, unit economics, and a credible path to significant returns. Storytelling may open the door, but numbers make the business investable.

Investors also want to understand what changes because the company exists. A strong business should create access, build trust, improve retention, or solve a problem people repeatedly face. The company must understand its audience, deliver consistently, and show that the team can execute with discipline. Early engagement, behavioural data, a prototype, or initial commercial indicators can make that case far stronger.

Choose the right investors

Not all capital supports the same kind of growth. Niche businesses need investors who understand industry, customer behaviour, and long-term value built through community. Fast capital can become expensive if it pushes the company in the wrong direction.

Founders should look beyond traditional angel and venture capital routes and consider strategic investors, grants, corporate partnerships, and ecosystem-backed programmes where relevant. For instance, in February 2026, UAE-based startups secured $162.8 million across 23 deals, nearly half of the region’s total funding that month. This funding momentum is reinforced by government-backed initiatives such as the National Agenda for Entrepreneurship, Future100, Hub71, accelerators, free zones, and startup incentives that improve access to capital, talent, partners, and new markets.

Standard Chartered today announced the appointment of Michelle Swanepoel as Head of Financing and Securities Services (FSS), Middle East and Africa. Based in Dubai, she will lead the business across the region  effective 1 July 2026. Michelle succeeds Scott Dickinson, who will be retiring from the bank on 30 June after more than 40 years in financial services.

Michelle Swanepoel joined Standard Chartered in September 2017 as the Regional Head of Business Account Management for the Middle East and Africa and was appointed the Regional Head of Securities Services for Africa in May 2019. In September 2024, her role expanded to include Head of Markets for South Africa.

“Michelle has played a strong leadership role in the evolution of post‑trade servicing across Sub‑Saharan Africa, supporting capital market development, regulatory reform, enhanced investor access and market infrastructure, and is a recognised industry subject‑matter expert,” said Margaret Harwood-Jones, Global Head of FSS. “I have every confidence that Michelle will drive further momentum in the region, building on the solid foundation established by Scott.”

Scott Dickinson joined Standard Chartered in 2017 and he has led the Bank’s FSS franchise in MEA since 2019. During his tenure, he oversaw strong growth across the Middle East and Africa franchise, supported expansion into markets including Saudi Arabia and Egypt, and helped deliver the Bank’s first Digital Asset Custody capability in the Dubai International Financial Centre.