Gad Zeevi

Gad Zeevi (Hebrew: גד זאבי, also Gad Zevi; born November 13, 1939) is an Israeli industrialist. Zeevi is the owner and chairman of the Zeevi Group, a multimillion-dollar private equity corporation. The Zeevi Group, through its subsidiaries, produces, refines, and sells petroleum products. It manages petroleum refineries and a chain of gas stations in the United States. The company also engages in the construction and exploitation of electric power stations, producing electric power for the national network; development, building, and construction of city housing estates, trade centers, places of residence, grain elevators, airports, water projects, and roads in Africa, America, and Israel; and distribution of automobiles. In addition, the Zeevi Groupprovides information technologies, logistical, retailing, and other business services, as well as medical equipment and sanatoria.

The Zeevi Group purchased "Japanauto", the exclusive Israeli distributor for Subaru cars, in 1998. The Gad Zeevi Group invests in private hospitals, radio and television stations, shopping malls, written media, apartment and industrial real estate development, health care, car industry, and more. The Zeevi Group has led energy projects in Africa, America, Europe and Israel, including the construction and exploitation of electric power stations for national networks, trade in crude oil and oil products.

The Zeevi Grouphas led energy projects in Africa, America, Europe and Israel, including the construction and exploitation of electric power stations for national networks, trade in crude oil and oil products.

The Zeevi Group has been involved in various ventures across a quarter of a century, including the development, construction and management of large-scale urban projects, commercial and residential complexes, silos, airports, water projects, and thousands of kilometers of roads in Africa and Israel.

The Group owns significant real estate interests, comprising thousands of residential and commercial areas, hospitals and retirement villages:

• Over 1 million m² in Israel
• Over 500,000m² in Eastern Europe
• 2,000 residential apartments and 300,000 m² of new commercial areas in USA

The Zeevi Group also owns the largest shopping center in Israel, covering a total area of 250,000 m².

The Zeevi Group owns Israel’s largest private hospitals, equipped with the most updated medical equipment, including VCT, MRI, IVF, laser operations and a state-of-the-art pressure chamber. The Group also owns luxury retirement villages, situated in proximity to the hospitals.

The Zeevi Group has interests in regional and international television and radio companies including Keshet, one of Israel's leading broadcasting agencies.

Play4Skill's business model is based on fee games that include on-site advertising, as well as games for pay. The company is developing an additional B2B business model to license its products to portals and online games sites. Gad Zeevi controls the company, after investing $2.1 million in it in 2009.

Throughout the 1970-80's, operating in Israel, U.S.A, Africa and Eastern Europe, all The Zeevi Group’s logistics companies have been leaders in their field, ranging from freight forwarding and customs clearance, to inland port terminals, container handling, storage and third party logistics.

The Gad Zeevi Group purchased Japanauto, the Israeli distributor of Subaru cars, in 1998. has been marketing Subaru since 1968 and was a pioneer in bringing Japanese cars to the Israeli market, holding 50% of the local car market in the 1970s and 1980s with annual sales of over 30,000 vehicles. Under The Zeevi Group’s guidance, the company established the biggest after-sales service infrastructure in Israel, providing the reach, the people, the know-how, and the service centers needed to satisfy this highly demanding market. Being the sole importer in the country to market a single brand, while the competition represent various brands with conflicting interests, Japanauto is currently looking for strategically synergetic franchising opportunities to expand by providing new brands, models, car sizes and engine volumes to fit the Israeli market. Various speculation in Israel has arisen towards Mr. Zeevi's plans to expand his car importation enterprise. One of Israel's leading financial newspaper, Globes, recently reported that the Ze'vi Group will be exclusively importinginto Israel.

The Israeli car market sells 180,000 cars annually with potential growth of over 6% a year. Gad Zeevi has imported and sold hundreds of thousands of Subaru cars to Israel.

According to Globes Magazine, Gad Zeevi sold his shares of Japanauto Holdings Ltd. for an estimated 160 million NIS (~50 million USD) in May 2012. Japan Auto Holdings is the publicly traded parent company of the Subaru importer.

Zeevi Group was involved in the privatization of Balkan Bulgarian Airlines in Bulgaria.Gets national air carrier Balkan with preferences for future development and sell it for a quick profit .

In March 2011, The Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court acquitted Gad Ze’evi and three other executives from Malam of charges of fraud.

The trial against Ze’evi lasted five years and included dozens of court hearings. Ze’evi who was chairman of IT giant Malam Systems was indicted in 2006 of committing stock fraud in order to increase his monthly salary. In her closing remarks, as published in both the Jerusalem Post & Globes daily newspapers, Judge Daniela Cherizli criticized the local Israeli district attorneys office for drawing out the trial unnecessarily.

"I am not going into personal issues. I kept the verdict professional and objective, even though I strongly wanted to say what I thought during the hearing. Things could have been much shorter," Judge Cherizli told the prosecutors. "I did not halt the hearing only out of the respect that I have for the prosecution. It was really irrelevant."

Judge Cherizli added that the legal material was clear, and so was the required verdict. "At the end of the day, everything focused on the issue of the shares. I made no normative statement whether the shares were tainted or not, but I think that act by the accused was neither false nor unreasonable. I thoroughly examined all the material. In general, I think that Mr. Tiber did not err according to the specific material in this case." Judge Cherizli also criticized the Israel Securities Authority for not providing an opinion on the case. "I would have expected the Securities Authority to express an opinion, but it did not do so, so what I am expected to do? The grounds for a charge of fraudulent receiving have been undercut. More than necessary, I discussed the question whether there were misleading details in the various documents. There was no conspiracy, and I therefore acquit the accused of all charges in the indictment."

Gad Zeevi regularly donates to local and international art museums, schools, health and education and in Jan 2011 he personally donated 200,000 NIS in vehicles and parts to Elem, a Haifa-based charity organization which focuses on assisting needy children with food, clothing, education and social activities.