Humble Beginnings
AIEX was founded as a 'Collective Investment Club' (CIC) in 2009 by two partners. Our primary aim was to access investment opportunities between club members thereby offering small investors access to traditionally capital-intensive opportunities, namely real estate. We went through a process of raising capital, purchasing, renovating and reselling residential real estate, and returning the capital to club members at the end of each cycle.
What We've Become
Since our humble beginnings, our activity has developed substantially.
We are no longer a CIC but have grown into a substantial investor and business partner. AIEX creates strategic alliances as an involved and integrated business partner to ensure that our partnerships gain exposure to high-growth opportunities across sectors.
We have established our reputation as a consistent identifier of high growth businesses and a strong investment partner, delivering superior performance and adding value to all stakeholders among our partnerships and clients. Our heritage is varied, and our broad experience has given AIEX a unique insight into the interconnectivity between business relationships across regions, cultures and sectors. This unique "AIEXperience" is what makes AIEX a partner of strategic choice in our various investments, and though we enter into a particular relationship with one initial set of aims specific to that activity, we can't help but let our global view impact the way we grow our partnerships in new, exciting, unforeseen avenues.
It is this eclectic mix of capital, diversity of business investments, superior executive network, and ever-creative ideas that make AIEX the go-to partner for new business development and co-investment.
Translating Vision Into Reality
AIEX has become a diversified investment group, with more than fifteen active subsidiaries across multiple sectors. Our aim is not just to grow larger, but to maintain a focus on existing partnerships and relationships strategically in their respective markets, snatching market share from our competitors and disrupting old business models to create fresh ideas and supernormal results.
This growth will continue to come out of a core strength in real estate, which has always served AIEX as a foundation on which to build networks and spark new activities.
Vivian Watts, Founder and Managing Director
Viv is an innovative investor and entrepreneur, having founded and built several businesses to scale with exits for AIEX and its partners. After reading for a BSc in Accounting & Finance at Warwick Business School, Viv began his career in Debt Capital Markets (Merrill Lynch) and Private Equity in the UK and the Middle East, specialising in all aspects of direct investment and portfolio management
Having left the world of banking, Viv now concentrates his time on expanding AIEX's portfolio, overseeing existing investments as well as developing new business streams, taking strong business partners into new frontier markets, such as the Middle East and North Africa.