Pakistani-American Dilawar Syed to serve as deputy head of small businesses agency in US
United States President Joe Biden has announced that Pakistani-American, Dilawar Syed, will serve as Deputy Administrator of the Small Business Administration (SBA), according to a White House statement.
“Dilawar Syed, of California, to be Deputy Administrator of the Small Business Administration, vice Althea Coetzee” the March 3 statement reads.
Syed would bring experience in artificial intelligence for healthcare to the role of deputy administrator at SBA. Confirming the news, Dilawar said on Twitter that he was “deeply humbled & honored” on the nomination, which is yet to be confirmed by the US Senate.
“If confirmed, I will put my heart and soul into helping small businesses everywhere in these challenging times,” Dilawar said, adding that the “grit” of small businesses made America strong.
Biden previously inducted two other Pakistanis in his team including Pakistani-American Salman Ahmed who was inducted into his foreign policy team and Pakistan-born climate expert, Ali Zaidi, to serve as his Deputy National Climate Adviser.
Who is Dilawar Syed?
Dilawar Syed is President and CEO at Lumiata, an AI for healthcare company focused on reducing healthcare costs and improving patient outcomes. Syed earlier served as the President at Freshworks where he helped scale the software company’s products to thousands of small and medium businesses. Syed has driven civic efforts at the federal, state, and local level focusing on economic growth and entrepreneurship.
Syed also served on US President Obama’s White House Commission on Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders (AAPIs) and chaired the White House Initiative on AAPIs’ Economic Growth Committee.
He immigrated to the United States from Pakistan as a freshman student to attend The College of Wooster in Ohio. Dilawar Syed holds an M.B.A. from Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania and a B.A. in Economics and Computer Science from the University of Texas at Austin.