Firm represents the latest in the Mirando family’s 110-year tradition of design innovation

United States, 10th Sep 2026 – MIKEADV CORP, the Boston-based, award-winning Integrated Marketing Communications agency known for handcrafted logo design, web development, and search engine optimization (SEO) services, is celebrating its 20th year in business. The anniversary comes 110 years after agency founder Mike Miranda’s great-uncles, Felix and Mike Miranda known as Mirando  came to the United States from Italy and started the Imperial Knife Company. In a tribute to his great-uncle, MIKEADV CORP’s Founder Mike Miranda was named after him, carrying not just his name, but it seems, his gift for design. 

Like MIKEADV, Imperial Knife Co. was committed to design excellence. “My great-uncle, after whom I was named, was a master of design and manufacturing craft,” explained Mike. “This talent with design runs in the family, apparently, and has been my inspiration in all my client work. As design increasingly gets absorbed into AI-driven processes, I feel the need for true design work is all the more urgent.” Virtually every early-stage client concept at MIKEADV is drawn by hand. “We’re pencil and paper guys,” Mike added. “From my brain to the paper; that’s really the only way to design something that stands out. The digitization comes later. My great-uncle understood this well, and the success he enjoyed with Imperial Knife Company bears it out.” 

Felix and Michael “Mike” Mirando came to the United States from Frosolone, Italy, a town in the Molise region with a long tradition of cutlery making. They settled in Providence, Rhode Island, where the city’s Jewelry District provided an ideal environment for skilled metalworking and small-scale manufacturing.

In 1916, the Mirando brothers established what became the Imperial Knife Company. Their boyhood friend and fellow Frosolone native, Domenic A. Fazzano, later joined them in the business. The company’s earliest work was closely connected to Providence’s jewelry trade. Imperial produced simple knife components, including metal “skeletons” that local jewelers could finish in gold or silver and turn into pocket-watch chain knives.

That market began to change during the 1920s as wristwatches increasingly replaced pocket watches. Imperial responded by expanding into the manufacture of complete pocketknives, developing the high-volume production methods that would eventually make the company one of the largest knife manufacturers in America.

The Great Depression presented another challenge—and an opportunity. Consumers had less money to spend, and manufacturers needed to produce useful goods at lower prices. Imperial became known for inexpensive stamped-metal construction and colorful plastic handle materials that allowed it to manufacture pocketknives efficiently and in large quantities. Felix Mirando was a named inventor on patents covering Imperial’s innovative knife-handle construction, including a 1939 patent involving plastic material applied to a metal knife-handle assembly.

The strategy helped Imperial grow dramatically. Rhode Island historical records indicate that the company employed approximately 1,000 workers by 1929. Its Providence operation eventually expanded to four buildings around Imperial Place, becoming a major presence in the city’s Jewelry District.

By the late 1930s, Imperial’s production had reached extraordinary levels. In a later interview, Mike Mirando recalled production of approximately 10,000 pocketknives per hour. By 1940, Imperial was the world’s largest producer of pocketknives, with historical accounts placing its production at as many as 100,000 knives per day.

Imperial’s story did not end with its early Providence factories. In 1957, the company acquired the former Rochambeau Worsted Company property at 60 King Street in Providence. The facility became an important part of Imperial’s later manufacturing operations, including the production of stainless-steel tableware. After the original Jewelry District operation closed in the 1970s, the King Street plant became Imperial’s principal production facility and remained in use until 1987.

Today, Imperial’s former Providence factories remain part of the city’s industrial heritage. The former Vesta Knitting Mills buildings associated with Imperial stand around Imperial Place and are recognized within Providence’s historic Jewelry District. GoProvidence, Providence’s official tourism organization, includes Imperial Place in its self-guided Jewelry District history tour, recognizing the company’s importance to the neighborhood and to Providence’s manufacturing history.

The story of Imperial Knife is ultimately a story of immigration, craftsmanship, innovation, and American mass production. Two brothers from Frosolone entered Providence’s jewelry-manufacturing world and built a company that grew from a small workshop making components for jewelers into a global-scale producer of affordable pocketknives. Imperial helped make the pocketknife an everyday American tool—and left a lasting mark on the industrial history of Providence, Rhode Island.

“Imperial Knife thrived even during the era of mass production,” Mike reflected. “They were able to do this because they were obsessed with craft. We’re going through a similar phase now with AI, which represents mass automated design. We respond with obsessive handcraft. It’s the same family instinct, playing out in a new century.”

For more information, https://mikeadv.com 

Media Contact

Organization: MIKEADV

Contact Person: Mike Mirando

Website: https://mikeadv.com

Email: Send Email

Country: United States

Release id: 48971

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Dubai, UAE, September 10th, 2026, Chainwire

Zamanat Fund CEIC Limited is the company’s first live proof point for regulated fund tokenization on ZIGChain focused on GCC private credit.

Zamanat today announced its sponsorship of Zamanat Fund CEIC Limited (the “Fund”), a DIFC-domiciled tokenized private credit fund with a target size of up to USD 100 million. The Fund targets the GCC’s estimated $250 billion SME financing gap, with only 11 percent of SMEs across the region having access to credit.

Closing a $250 billion structural gap in GCC SME credit

Across the GCC, SMEs are central to economic growth yet remain significantly underserved by traditional financing. In the UAE, SMEs generate more than half of GDP and employ the majority of the private-sector workforce, yet receive less than 10 percent of total bank lending.

The Fund will invest in private credit across the region, directing capital towards strong homegrown companies whose financing needs are not fully met through traditional lending channels. The strategy supports national ambitions to expand SME participation, private-sector growth and access to alternative financing, including priorities set out under Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 and the UAE Centennial 2071.

“Strong businesses across the GCC still struggle to access growth capital despite sound fundamentals. Zamanat sponsored the Fund to create a credible route between those businesses and institutional capital. With a target size of up to USD 100 million and interests issued as Investment Tokens, it is our first live proof point for bringing GCC private credit into a regulated digital structure for Professional Clients,” said Umair Tariq, Founder and CEO of Zamanat.

Bringing GCC private credit into digital markets

Tokenization expands the infrastructure around traditionally hard-to-access private-market assets without changing the underlying investment or credit profile.

The Fund combines a regional private credit strategy, a DIFC fund structure, institutional administration and digital issuance on ZIGChain. It provides a first live demonstration of how regional private credit can be brought into a DFSA-regulated tokenized structure for Professional Clients.

The Fund is a DFSA-regulated closed-ended fund registered as an Exempt Fund and classified as a Credit Fund. It is managed by Truleum Venture Partners Limited and administered by Apex Group. Fund interests will be issued as ZM1 Investment Tokens on ZIGChain within a regulated, whitelisted environment.

As sponsor, Zamanat brings its regional private credit, investment structuring and institutional partnership expertise to the Fund’s development. Truleum retains responsibility for all regulated fund-management activities.

The ZM1 Investment Token structure provides a blockchain-native ownership and settlement layer within the Fund’s regulated framework. It also allows qualifying investors who meet the DFSA Professional Client criteria to participate alongside institutional investors.

Zamanat is backed by Disrupt.com, a MENA-based, operator-led AI-native venture builder and lead investor in the business.

Building the global market for Digital Shariah Assets

Global Islamic finance assets are projected to reach $9.7 trillion by 2029, yet demand for digital and Shariah-aligned assets is growing faster than the institutional infrastructure connecting them with global capital.

Zamanat continues to build the global market for Digital Shariah Assets. Its wider operating model combines investment structuring, Shariah expertise, regulated partner routes and digital distribution to bring real-world assets to market through traditional and digital channels.

The DIFC-domiciled Fund evidences the regulated fund-tokenization, digital ownership and partner-orchestration capability within that wider build. Zamanat is progressing a separate pipeline of Digital Shariah Assets across private credit, receivables, real estate and other asset classes.

Institutional partnerships

Apex Group acts as Fund Administrator, providing institutional fund administration and controls from the outset.

“Zamanat is supporting the creation of a new category in Digital Assets. Bringing institutional structure and digital distribution together within a DFSA-regulated framework sets the standard for how this market should be built, and this fund shows the model working at institutional scale. We are proud to support the infrastructure behind it, and we look forward to partnering further on the projects Zamanat already has in motion,” said Peter Hughes, Founder & CEO, Apex Group.

The global market for Digital Shariah Assets does not yet exist as an institutional category. Zamanat is building it.

Notes to Editors

Sources

LSEG and ICD, 2025 Islamic Finance Development Indicator Report, 14 October 2025 (global Islamic finance assets projected to reach $9.7 trillion by 2029); World Bank, Competition in the GCC SME Lending Markets: An Initial Assessment (estimated $250 billion GCC SME credit gap; 11 percent of SMEs with access to credit); Kearney, GCC Retail Banking Radar 2024.

Investor notice

This communication as related to Zamanat Fund CEIC Limited is approved by Truleum Venture Partners Limited in the DIFC (DFSA License Number: F008013).

This release is for information only. It is not an offer, invitation or recommendation to subscribe for interests in Zamanat Fund CEIC Limited or acquire ZM1 Investment Tokens. Any participation will be made only through the Fund Manager, final offering documents and applicable Professional Client eligibility requirements. For avoidance of doubt, this communication is intended for and directed only to investors who meet the requirements to be considered Professional Clients as specified under the Dubai Financial Services Authority Conduct of Business Rulebook, Rule 2.3.3. The Fund is an ‘Exempt Fund’. Accordingly, the ZM1 Investment Tokens are available only to Professional Clients.

This release and the information contained herein does not constitute, and is not intended to constitute, a public offer of securities in any other jurisdiction and accordingly should not be construed as such. The ZM1 Investment Tokens are only available to a limited number of investors from the DIFC. The ZM1 Investment Tokens have not been approved by or licensed or registered with any other relevant licensing authority or governmental agency. No transaction will be concluded in onshore UAE outside the DIFC.

The Fund is not an Islamic Fund and is not marketed as Shariah-compliant. References to Shariah in this release relate to Zamanat’s broader platform and market ambition and not to the Fund.

About Zamanat

Zamanat is building the global market for Digital Shariah Assets. The company connects asset originators with global capital through investment structuring, Shariah expertise, regulated partner routes, tokenization and distribution across traditional and digital channels.

Zamanat also sponsors and develops institutional investment products through appropriately licensed partners. Each product follows its own legal and regulatory framework and, where presented as Shariah-aligned, its own product-specific Shariah review and governance process. Website: www.zamanathq.com

Contact

Global Head of PR & Communications
Katarzyna Kosior
disrupt.com
info@zamanathq.com