Apex Equity Holdings Berhad has appointed Dato’ Zakaria Bin Arshad as CEO effective October 20, 2023. He is 64 years old. He completed the Corporate Partnership Program from Pembroke College, University of Cambridge, UK, the Senior Management Development Program from Harvard Business School and the BSc in Social Sciences-Economics (Hons) from the University of Science Malaysia , Penang.

Dato Zakaria is a member of the board of directors of Koperasi Permodalan Felda Malaysia Berhad. He is a member of the International Nanoscience Society, Cambridge, UK, and a member of Vistage Worldwide Inc. USA, for CEOs and SME owners. He is also an advisor to the Malaysian Robotics and Automation Society, the Mobile Food Truck and Street Food Association and the Sekolah Agama Rakyat in Felda Palong 1, NS Dato Zakaria has extensive experience in the palm oil sector, from upstream to downstream, managing approximately 440,000 hectares of plantations in Malaysia and Indonesia and producing 3 million tonnes of CPO in 68 plants in Malaysia.

It is responsible for developing and improving innovative technologies and approaches to be applied in upstream, midstream and downstream operations through R&D and production of downstream palm oil products, including the conversion of CPO and palm kernel into value-added products, conversion of waste into wealth and biomass energy. , etc. In previous years, Dato has also been involved in rubber industries such as the production of premium rubber (SMR, SIR, SCR), as well as latex concentrate, rubber gloves and rubber industries, synthetic gloves for dentists and sterile gloves for the electronic sector. He has been responsible for increasing the revenue stream by producing specialty rubbers and strict tire manufacturers for Europe, China, Japan and other markets.

Dato also worked for Malaysia Cocoa Manufacturing (MCM), a joint venture between Nestlé Switzerland and Felda, and is primarily responsible for marketing cocoa products to international manufacturers. Dato has skills in shipping, currency risk hedging, commodity positioning and analysis, particularly for commodity trading (e.g. CPO, sugar, cocoa products, rubber). He also has experience in liquid storage, grain terminal and plantation fertilizer purchasing.