At 19, in 1990, with just £100 in his pocket, Selva arrived in the UK from Sri Lanka as a student. As a result of the Civil War in his home country, Selva became a refugee. His parents weren’t able to send him to a UK university to study for a degree, their circumstances being altered by the war, so Selva enrolled in a chartered accountancy course. After qualifying as a chartered management accountant, Selva worked in senior roles in globally renowned financial and investment institutions, including Prudential Financial Inc for a decade, then Fortress Investment Group, Schroders and Grosvenor. In 1999, working full-time but struggling to make ends meet, Selva started giving private tuition for £20 an hour. This first foray into education led to Selva, his life and business partner Tharshiny Pankaj and Selva’s late father founding Regent Independent College: Regent Global was born. In 2009 Selva left the investment banking sector. He is now Group Chairman of Regent Global.

Regent Global today

Regent Global launched a new digital university in San Marino in 2025 – Regent European University (REU) – which Selva is Rector of. A further digital university in the United States – Regent American University (RAU) – will welcome its first students in 2026. Selva and Tharshiny are also in the final stages of creating a state-of-the-art new British university, Regent Hill London (RHL) subject to approval, with an emphasis on a mindset shift to unleash human natural intelligence. RHL will launch in September 2026 offering a premium MBA. Selva is steering Regent Global as a leading global technology-enabled education provider, fuelled by the metaverse and Web 3.0. Selva knows this is achievable: his book Thinking into Character explains how anyone can create the success they want by transforming their thinking, habits and behaviours. Selva’s own story shows how much is possible.

Regent Global celebrated its 25th anniversary in 2024. Although it has grown to be a global business working in education, impactful investment and economy building, it operates as One Regent. Working as One Regent ensures that the company’s ethos and values are reflected in all of Regent Global’s businesses. Regent Global’s current activities are outlined below.

• Regent College London (RCL), a higher education business operating in the UK and beyond. RCL launched University Study Centre in Dubai with INTO University Partnerships in 2025 and RCL Mumbai in March 2026. A further RCL branch will follow in Malta in 2026.
• Regent Real Estate, working in residential and commercial property development and investments in the UK, UAE, USA and Sri Lanka.
• In Dubai, Regent has acquired Gulf Indian High School (GIHS), one of the oldest schools in the state, and is planning a new K-12 British curriculum school with one of the UK’s leading independent schools, Woldingham.
• Also in Dubai, Regent Global operates Regent Institute Middle East (RIME), a Technical and Vocational Education and Training centre.
• Regent Global is working towards establishing a Dubai Global Forum (DGF) to become an economic bridge between Dubai and global markets.
• Regent Lifestyle Dubai is a lifestyle and business services company dedicated to making life in the UAE seamless, enjoyable and rewarding. It offers a range of services including real estate and tourism.
• Regent Investment Management (RIM) is a boutique investment firm with share investments and an outsourcing management company. It is exploring several joint ventures globally.
• Regent Global is setting up businesses to make the most of new technologies. Regent Imagination Design and Execution 21 (Ride21) is a series of innovation hubs in global tech hotspots such as London, New York, San Francisco and Dubai, where brilliant minds come together to tackle real-world challenges using the latest technology, including AI. AI Regent plc (AIR) focuses on how organisations can use AI.
• Regent Talent Exchange (RTX) kickstarts careers through J-1 visas to the USA.

The Regent Global philosophy

Selva is passionate about the opportunities that technology presents for education when paired with innate human potential: artificial intelligence plus natural intelligence. The partnership that Selva has forged with Stanford Online (part of Stanford University) offers Regent students and staff access to an unparalleled educational programme.

Selva is an educator and lifelong learner. He still teaches and has written books to help students and adults achieve the success they want. Selva has received four honorary doctorates in the last decade for his contribution to education in the UK, USA and Mexico. He has also been awarded the title of Honorary Professor by REU and adopted the title Professor to reflect his work in teaching and writing. Selva’s books – Thinking into Character, The Power of Learning from DAD, The Mindset and The Science of Natural Intelligence – and the supporting transformational inside-out education programmes are part of the offer at Regent Global institutions. Alongside Selva’s synopsis of Napoleon Hill’s book Think and Grow Rich, they build on the inside-out education and personal development approach that Selva learned through his executive education at London Business School, Harvard Business School, Oxford University Saiid Business School, and Stanford Graduate School, California (an education that Selva continues to this day, regularly studying at Stanford University and contributing to its Design School).

The ideas in the Thinking into Character programmes transformed the lives of many Americans from the 1930s to the 1970s and after the Great Depression in particular. Today, the leaders of the fastest growing companies in Silicon Valley, California follow these principles. Selva aims to offer these ideas to as many people as possible. He made his programmes available to the people of Sri Lanka for free through Public Learn, a platform created by Regent and gifted to Sri Lanka, that democratises education by enabling people to access free courses from world-leading institutions. Selva is also sharing these ideas in a regular programme on Sunrise Radio called Our Changing World. Selva has also shared his insights on AI in an article recently published by Forbes.

Philanthropy

By innovating and leading in education, Selva is seeking to create a more prosperous and equitable future for all in the UK and internationally. In 2023, Selva was appointed as Chair of the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award Sustainability 70 Steering Group (SG70). The group is responsible for ensuring the long-term sustainability of the award, so that it can enrich the lives of more young individuals, enabling them to realise their potential and make a positive impact on the world through non-formal education. Selva is also Leader of the Founder’s 100 Campaign and Benefactor of the Duke of Edinburgh’s International Award, a patron of the Prince’s Trust and British Asian Trust and a supporter of Esharelife Foundation.

Selva takes his civic duties in the UK very seriously and, as part of giving back to his adopted country, leads the Global Unity Forum. Initially, the Forum focused on building unity among the Sri Lankan diaspora in the UK and other western countries (over half a million British Sri Lankans live in the UK and Selva is very keen they integrate with British society, move forward with unity and forgive the atrocities committed during the Civil War in Sri Lanka). Today, the Forum’s ambitions extend to encouraging unity, peace and understanding across all nations and communities through the annual Global Unity Dinner (GUD). The Pankaj Foundation brings together the Pankaj’s philanthropic activities and other projects of importance to the family outside of Regent Global. As well as SG70 and GUD, these include the Universities Global Challenge, an annual prize supporting human-centred AI research to be presented at World Governments Summit, and the Future of Education, a programme to integrate natural intelligence and artificial intelligence as part of India Global Forum. In July 2025, Selva joined the JA Worldwide Global Council. For over 100 years, JA Worldwide has helped young people in more than 100 countries develop the employment and entrepreneurial tools to find meaningful work and start sustainable companies. The Global Council is a body of distinguished individuals who are committed to the mission of JA around the world.

Awards and recognition

Selva has received several awards, namely Business Person of the Year at the 2025 Asian Achievers Awards, Visionary Business Leader of the Year at the British Asians Who’s Who Awards 2025, Forward-Thinking CEO at the Burj CEO Awards 2025, Entrepreneur of the Year at the British Sri Lankan Awards 2023, Businessman of the Year at the London Asian Business Awards 2019, and Entrepreneur of the Year at the Asian Achievers Awards 2016. In 2022, Regent Global was recognised in The Times Top 100 for being one of the fastest-growing education companies in the UK. In 2023, Regent Global won the GG2 ED&I Award for Excellence in Education. Selva was named in the Asian Rich List 101 Wealthiest Asians in 2024 and 2025 for climbing the growth ladder and was included in the Top 100 Influential People by Awards Intelligence in 2024 and 2025. In 2024, the World Economic Forum (WEF) granted Regent Global WEF membership, recognising the company’s contribution to a sustainable future. In November 2025, Regent Global won the WEF New Champions Community Choice award. Selva attended the World Governments Summit in Dubai in 2025 as a panel member and strategic partner. Selva and Tharshiny are global citizens; they are proud of their British citizenship and are honoured to also hold residencies for the USA, UAE, Sri Lanka and Malta.

Between 2010 and 2024, Selva learned a great deal from working with four prime ministers– David Cameron, Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Rishi Sunak – as a member of the Leader’s Group, including as part of the Conservative Party Advisory Board for the latter two PMs.

Selva enjoys music and is a cricket enthusiast who talks about managing business and life as a game of cricket. Selva and Tharshiny are a package; they need one another to reach their mutual goals and achieve the Regent vision: the end result of education is character. Regent Global is a family business; Selva and Tharshiny’s eldest daughter Sharanie leads the next generation Regent Global team and their youngest daughter Dharanie has also joined the business on a part-time basis while she completes her university studies.