Khaled Ahmed Sharbatly, Chief Executive Officer of Desert Technologies, the Saudi global Leader in Renewable Energy and Smart Infrastructure solutions and the first Saudi company to manufacture and export photovoltaic solar panels, participated in a specialized dialogue session held on the sidelines of the 56th Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum – Davos 2026. The event took place in Davos, Switzerland, from January 19th to 23rd under the theme “The Spirit of Dialogue.”
Sharbatly’s participation came as part of the dialogue session held on January 22nd titled “From Capital to Catalyst: Leveraging Family Capital to Drive Systemic Transformation,” organized by the Family Business Network (FBN). The session brought together a distinguished group of international leaders and experts, including Nike Anani and Pauline Borg, who discussed ways to activate family capital as a powerful tool for driving sustainable, transformative change across sectors and regions.
The session highlighted the pivotal role of family-owned enterprises in moving beyond individual initiatives and isolated innovations toward broad-based adoption that enables coordinated, systemic change leveraging the trust, resilience, and long-term capital that characterize business families worldwide.
During the session, Khaled Sharbatly stated: “Family capital has a real opportunity to move beyond its traditional role as a source of funding to become a catalyst for systemic change, particularly in vital sectors such as renewable energy and sustainable infrastructure. By directing investments based on clear values and a long-term vision, business families can play an effective role in accelerating economic transformation and achieving sustainable developmental impact that extends beyond local markets to global influence.”
Sharbatly emphasized that the participation of Saudi companies in such global dialogues reflects the growing stature of the Saudi economy and the role of the national private sector in supporting sustainability and innovation goals, in line with the objectives of Saudi Vision 2030.
This session was part of a series of dialogues organized by the Family Business Network (FBN) during the World Economic Forum 2026, aimed at exploring avenues for collaboration among business families and generating actionable insights to inform future initiatives. These include the FBN Impact Days in Arles, France (May 2026) and the FBN Global Summit in Cologne, Germany (October 2026).
It is worth noting that the Family Business Network (FBN) is the world’s leading organization for business families. Founded in 1989 and headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, FBN comprises more than 4,500 business families from 65 countries, representing over 20,000 members across generations, and works to empower business families to thrive across generations while building a more sustainable economic future.
