Bilal Baloch

Bilal Baloch is a partner at Shorooq, the region’s leading multistrategy investment firm. He leads Shorooq’s global artificial intelligence fund (backed by G42) and spearheads the process of value creation, diversifying and strengthening the fund’s investment and asset portfolio. Baloch is a co-founder and board member of Washington-based Enquire AI – a pioneering software enterprise he exited to Japan’s Uzabase that harnesses AI to validate and supply organizations globally with expert knowledge. Baloch was COO and then co-CEO at Enquire from 2016-23, during which time he secured a patent for the innovative matching technology that propels the Enquire platform.

Before his entrepreneurial venture with Enquire AI, Baloch directed the South Asia and Middle East & North Africa program at the prestigious Lauder Institute at the Wharton School of Business. During this time his book, When Ideas Matter, was published by Cambridge University Press in the autumn of 2021. It has been reviewed as “methodologically sophisticated and groundbreaking” on the study of political economy in developing countries. Elsewhere, Baloch honed his advisory work as an early team member and senior associate at Macro Advisory Partners in London, guiding professional services firms and private equity funds on investments in emerging and frontier markets. He continued consulting in this sector at New York-based Greenmantle, focusing on geopolitical strategy pertaining to South Asia and the Middle East and North Africa region.

Prior to his tenure in academia and consulting, Baloch was chief of staff to Dean Vali Nasr at Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, where he was instrumental in managing a $90 million operating budget and supporting Nasr’s strategic advisory with the U.S. government and global leaders. Baloch completed his undergraduate degree at The London School of Economics, where he was an Anthony Giddens scholar; master’s in international relations from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University as a Samuel J. Elder scholar; and his doctorate in political economy from Oxford University. Baloch serves on the boards of various technology startups and advisory board of the Georgetown Baratta Center for Global Business in Washington.