Prior to founding deNovo, May spent nearly 16 years at Morgan Stanley in numerous roles and geographies including New York, Hong Kong, London and Dubai. Most recently, she was Head of Investment Banking for the Middle East and North Africa region, where, in 2005, she established, led and grew Morgan Stanley’s inaugural Middle East regional presence headquartered in Dubai.
During her tenure with Morgan Stanley, May worked in a number of investment banking groups and in various leadership roles across Mergers, Acquisitions and Restructurings, Project Finance, Acquisition Finance, Liability Management, Private Placements, IPOs as well as pioneering Morgan Stanley’s Islamic Financing initiatives. May was the youngest woman to be named Managing Director at Morgan Stanley and the first Arab female Managing Director at Morgan Stanley.
In 2015, May was named Business Woman of the Year for the UAE at the Arab Woman Awards Ceremony; the award was bestowed by His Excellency Sheikh Nahayan bin Mubarak Al Nahayan. May has been ranked in top 500 Most Influential Arabs in Arabian Business magazine in 2013 and 2012 consecutively and was similarly ranked in the top 100 Most Influential Arab Women.May was also featured in the Financial Times List of The Leading Business Women in the Arab World. May has often been invited to speak in multiple Global Business and Economic Forums and Conferences internationally and regionally addressing topics such as: Corporate Finance, Mergers, Acquisitions and Restructurings, Global Capital Markets, Initial Public Offerings, Corporate Governance, etc. and has been quoted in numerous business articles in international and regional news publications on various business and economic related topics. May is involved in a number of non-for-profit initiatives and serves as Chairwoman of the Lebanese International Finance Executive (“LIFE”).
May graduated from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (“MIT”) with a Bachelor of Science in Economics and a Bachelor of Science in Political Science. May also received her Masters in Management and Finance from MIT’s Sloan School of Management. May comes from Lebanon and grew up in Kuwait before travelling to the US for her higher education. May is married and the mother of four boys.