THE LEADING TECH FESTIVAL FOR EMERGING MARKETS

Nagham is a key opinion leader. She seeks to spread Web3 knowledge and adoption by providing educational content on her social media site – “Bintcoin” Nagham was featured in numerous publications and participated as a guest speaker, panelist, and host in prominent blockchain events.

In her capacity as Executive Vice President of Strategy at Paymob, Imane is responsible for leading the development and execution of the company’s strategic vision. She also plays a key role in driving the company’s growth through the creation of new products and services, as well as the development of innovative business models. Imane is passionate about leading value-based digital transformation for all types of merchants to enable a more financially literate and inclusive world, by driving business growth, transparency, and value creation across the ecosystem. She is committed to developing ESG strategies that enable sustainable finance outcomes. Prior to joining Paymob, Imane led Mastercard’s acceptance business in the MENA region and was integral in developing strategies to digitize cash-heavy market segments. In addition, she was an avid driver of Mastercard’s vision of a “World Beyond Cash.” Imane also developed & executed the Microlending & BNPL segment strategy in EEMEA. Imane holds a Master of Science in Strategic Planning from Edinburgh Business School and a Bachelor of Business Administration degree from the American University in Cairo

Emir Isik is the Head of Business Development at Tarabut Gateway. He brings over 8 years of diverse sales & marketing experience that he attained in tech companies, Financial Institutions, and FinTechs in Boston, New York, Bahrain, and UAE respectively. Prior to joining Tarabut Gateway, Emir worked for Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch in New York, managing UHNW portfolios. He then discovered his passion for FinTech and made a move to Bahrain partnering with startups to manage their regulatory setup as well as assisting pioneers of newly emerging licensees to graduate from the CBB Regulatory Sandbox. He then worked for Arab Financial Services where he managed the P&L for their Merchant Program across acquiring as well as fintech solutions. As the Head of Business Development at Tarabut Gateway, Emir is responsible for sales strategies and execution of key value drivers for regional financial service clients across Bahrain, UAE, and Saudi Arabia. Emir holds a Bachelor of Science in Economics, and a minor in Business Administration from Northeastern University in Boston, Massachusetts, U.S.A, and has completed several certificate programs including Digital Marketing by Columbia Business School, Emeritus Institute of Management, and Payments Innovation Programme by Centre for Finance, Technology, and Entrepreneurship (CFTE)

Beginning his career in Investment Advisory in London, David has been working in the financial services sector for the past 10 years. Moving to the UAE five years ago, David has built two digital banks, working as both a Chief of Staff and a Chief Operating Officer. Currently working as the COO at Nomo Fintech, a Shariah-compliant digital challenger banking platform provider, David is a passionate fintech leader and keen advocate of organisational agility and promoting cultures of innovation and continuous improvement.

Nile is an experienced Payment’s technology and services executive who contributes as FinTech Mentor at DIFC FinTech Hive and who has recently joined the HyperPay team as the Senior Regional Director of Strategic Products. He has accumulated 20+ years of global experience in Sales, Product Management & Business Leadership roles at a variety of FinTech companies ranging in size from global multinationals to seed stage startups. His diverse background brings a deep understanding of the global landscape in the fields of; retail, digital payments, mobile wallets, personal money transfer, B2B remittance, emerging payment technology as well as government and the financial services sector regulation. Recognized as a payments industry specialist and Keynote Speaker, he has most recently represented global giants such as Mastercard and Worldline in the Middle East region.

Chris Scanlan is Group Head of Investor Relations for Pyypl, the most exciting next-generation consumer Fintech company in the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia. Chris also has led a corporate advisory business based in Dubai, working with international companies, Sovereign Wealth Fund’s, large family offices and other qualified investors to create valued partnerships and drive their business interests in the Middle East and North Africa. With over 15 years of international business experience, Chris held leadership roles for investment banks, multinational brokerages and a boutique investment house in London focused on equity capital markets. During this time, Chris ran equity securities finance trading and proprietary trading businesses in EMEA. Chris established strategic partnerships for a lifestyle technology platform called the ‘The Swing Index’ which provides coaching as a service.

Alexander played a critical role to scale SwissBorg from a five-person startup to a 250+ employee scale-up. His role encompasses effectively communicating complex ideas from the company’s thought leaders and visionaries in spoken or written formats. He helps to expand SwissBorg’s partner network, aligns people to find a win/win/win situation and combines synergies with other ecosystems to compound the outcome of a partnership. Alexander has been featured as a keynote/panellist/ educator at WEF Davos 2020/2022, Cointelegraph, Coindesk, Coin Bureau Live, Token2049, Le Figaro, Paris Blockchain Summit Week, Blockdown, AIM Summit, Cryptoslate and more. He is a certified TEDx Speaker and CryptonitesTV YouTube host and is known for his love for crypto investing, CeFi/DeFi, fundamental analysis and the evolution of Tokenomics.

Dubai-based journalist covering all sectors in the Middle East. Bylines include Reuters, Bloomberg Middle East, AGBI, Arabian Business, Arab News, Zawya, MEED, Entrepreneur, 7DAYS. Grant winner from the Thomson Reuters Foundation, Associate Fellow at Murdoch University, 2020 Summer School Fellow at the Reuters Institute For Journalism, University of Oxford.

As a Fellow of the Chartered Institute of Credit Management (FCICM, UK), Faraz holds expertise in Credit Management, specifically in the areas of order-to-cash processes, KYC, and Receivables Management. Faraz played a key role in a project aimed at digitizing a previously manual process of B2B Credit Assessment, resulting in the development of a first-of-its-kind web-based platform for KYC and Credit Rating. Additionally, Faraz has conducted reviews of KYC procedures in various industries across the region and provided tailored workshops and training programs to both commercial and finance teams to educate them on best practices for KYC and Credit Rating. Today, Faraz is the Co-founder of TREVEX, a digital platform that aims to bring a paradigm shifting perspective in KYC by reintroducing business transparency into the modern commercial space.

general partner at VentureSouq

Sameer is a flag-bearing advocate of ‘Starting with Why’, keeping ‘why’ at the heart of everything he does as a startup strategist & design evangelist. A staunch believer in the power of food bringing people together, he co-founded Spades to provide a contactless, yet affordable web-based dine-in solution for customers. According to Sameer, Spades’ origin story is a classic example of “necessity births innovation” which was realized in the year 2021 as the world readily adopted cashless payment methods, with a clear need for a frictionless and seamless payment solution. He co-founded Spades to enable the UAE market to stay ahead of the curve while challenging the status quo of ‘cash being king’.

Saad Ansari is the CEO and founder of Xpence – the financial management platform with embedded business banking solutions empowering MENAP businesses. An experienced business leader with over seventeen years of experience as an entrepreneur, Saad has launched ventures across Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE. Saad founded Xpence in 2018 after experiencing difficulties accessing banking services for his new business ventures in the MENAP region, being inspired to build a solution for businesses facing similar issues. He is a strong believer in the opportunities available in the region and the dynamism and hunger of its vibrant private sector, particularly in the technology and fintech space.

Céline is a FinTech content writer. Coming from a financial background, she provides insights on the financial markets and upcoming macroeconomic events. Her work as a Finance Research Analyst gives her a holistic view of financial markets, ensuring both a technical and fundamental approach is applied.

I am responsible for leading strategic partnerships for the Payments business unit at Finastra. At this stage of my career, I have been focusing on and around digital currencies, digital assets, decentralized finance, embedded finance and platforms. Over the last decade and half I have had the opportunity to experience and learn various aspects of financial technology business. ‘Business Strategy’, ‘Sales’, ‘Business Development’, ‘Solution Consulting’ and ‘Research and Development’, I have been involved in interactions with financial institutions globally. I acquired crucial global exposure and understanding of varied financial markets (with focus on but not limited to payments) by engaging with financial institutions across multiple countries across Middle East, Africa, Asia Pacific, Americas and LATAM, Europe and United Kingdom.

Khalil Alami is the Founder CEO of the leading online payment gateway, Telr. Khalil has more than two decades of experience in the financial services sector, including 20 years in the payment and card industry, with a focus on payment infrastructure and system implementation. Khalil has deep knowledge of industry structure, with emphasis on card processing and settlement, the four party system, international payments architecture, electronic and mobile payments, consumer touch points, and network security. Khalil is also a Member of the Regional Fintech Working Group of the Arab Monetary Fund. Khalil has an MBA from the American University of Beirut and a Bachelor of Science from Purdue University in Economics.

Karan (NayaOne, CEO) is a highly regarded finance technologist, bringing unique perspectives and real-life learnings from both financial institutions and start-up trenches. He is a multi-disciplinary CXO with expertise in delivering products to market, strategy, building complex trading applications, developing and leading high-performing teams. Featured on the UK top 30 CIO list, Karan has an in-depth understanding of applying technology to drive business objectives. He previously launched and successfully exited two businesses, a B2B RegTech and an Agile Delivery Consultancy with a customer base from ASX50. With an in-depth understanding of the finance and tech ecosystem in the UK, US and Australia, Karan is an advisor to trade associations and young businesses. Karan also advises various regulatory WGs and Think Tanks in the domains of Digital Transformation, Cybersecurity, Fintech Partnerships (Sandboxes, toolkits and Synthetic data) and Data (AI and Data sharing).

As Head of Robotic Process Automation at Axicorp, Elian Daoud has been an innovative leader in adopting and driving RPA throughout the enterprise. Over 15 years of experience in the FX Industry has helped Elian expand RPA to all departments by identifying Automation opportunities and overseeing the design and delivery of various quality solutions. Prior to working at Axicorp, Elian worked closely with management as Head of Account Services at Royal Financials Australia, helping to build their new branch by establishing the departments’ SOPs and the Business Intelligence infrastructure, which automated most back-office reports. Elian holds a Bachelor of Science from the American University of Science and Technology, specializing in Banking & Finance. He is also a certified RPA Developer from UiPath and a certified Lean Six Sigma Black Belt from IMC Institute.

Nameer Khan is a leading fintech leader in the MENA region. He was awarded as MENA’s Future Fintech Leader by Central Bank of UAE & Abu Dhabi Global Market. Nameer is a serial fintech founder & investor and serves as an executive advisor to leading fintechs, financial institutions and regulatory authorities in the MENA region. As the founding member and chairman of the MENA Fintech Association (MFTA), he has today created pivotal body comprising of leading Fintech stakeholders from across the region and together partnered with the regional regulators and central banks to establish a robust fintech framework. With his focus on sustainability for 2022 onwards. Nameer is a part of exciting fintech ventures focused on enabling sustainable impact, and through MFTA he’s also helping fintechs adopt sustainable practices, with the ambition of making MENA a leading sustainable fintech region.

Kareem has led different functions within the industry for both conventional and Islamic banks, as well as consulted all over the GCC, MENA, and Europe.