CEO, director and business partner with 25 years across digital transformation, financial technology and enterprise strategy. Based in Dubai, UAE, I operate across Africa, the Middle East and internationally, building businesses, closing complex deals and delivering technology-led solutions in some of the world’s most demanding markets.

Digital transformation, financial technology and enterprise strategy, since 1999.
Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Sweden, South Africa, Estonia, Finland, Ethiopia, Sudan, Uganda, Kenya, Yemen, Morocco, India, Ireland and the UK.
AI and product engineers at DAE India, our development centre.
Work that bridges academia, technology and lived market experience across three continents.
My career began in Saudi Arabia in 1999 at Assyst Saudi Arabia Ltd., an affiliate of Jamjoom Group in Riyadh. I sold, implemented and supported MCBA, one of the leading ERP systems of the era, then led the launch of a new division built around Microsoft Great Plains and other enterprise solutions, delivering implementations for some of the Kingdom's most significant organisations, including Aljomiah Group, Saudi Catering, Fippco, Al Naser Group and Astra Group, travelling across the Kingdom to do it. I was part of the Y2K upgrade cycle, a defining moment in enterprise technology that gave me a depth of systems and data experience few careers start with.
From there I moved to HansaWorld, a Swedish ERP company, rotating between the Stockholm headquarters, Dubai, Pretoria, Johannesburg and London simultaneously. That combination of on-the-ground Saudi delivery and cross-continental European and African exposure set the foundation for everything that followed.
My work bridges public and private sectors, connecting policy, capital and technology where they matter most.
I work as a partner, not as a consultant for hire. Alongside my partners, we bring a full operational stack: a 30+ person AI and development centre in India, regional offices and distribution networks across East Africa and Morocco, and specialist partners across Ireland, the UK and the UAE. Clients and partners engage me, but they get the full weight of that ecosystem behind every mandate.
I lead and partner on the following, bringing both personal expertise and a full operational network to each.
Payment infrastructure, PSP and switch design, BNPL and financial inclusion.
We manage one of the largest service centres for Hitachi recycler machines, working directly with Hitachi Japan and Hitachi India on payment solutions. Our operation covers the full cycle: sales, implementation and ongoing support, backed by direct manufacturer relationships at the highest level.
At the core of our operation is Digital Automation Enterprise (DAE) India, a dedicated development centre housing 30+ specialists across AI, product engineering and the latest development tools. This is our kitchen: the place where every new technology, intelligence layer and product we take to market is conceived, built and refined. DAE India enables all our international operations, complemented by additional technology partnerships across India.
Enterprise and government transformation strategies, AI consulting and capacity building.
National strategy roadmaps, digital economy frameworks and PPP structuring.
Strategy, technology selection and end-to-end implementation.
We lead large organisations through full infrastructure transformation from 3G and 4G to 5G, designing and delivering Fiber to the Home (FTTH) programmes, GPU data centre infrastructure strategy in Africa, and enterprise digital services and payment integration for telco operators.
From 2016 to date, working closely with startups across MEA and Africa wearing both hats at once: as an entrepreneur building ventures and as an investor evaluating and funding them. Founders at every stage from seed to upper rounds, advising on growth strategy, business model and investor readiness. Alongside international VCs including Intuition VC (United States), and part of multiple startup initiatives across the Middle East and Africa. A study visit to Estonia, one of the world's most concentrated unicorn ecosystems, deepened my understanding of how high-growth startup cultures are built and scaled.
Every solution I have built is backed by academic rigour, real market data and on-the-ground experience.
Financial inclusion for SACCOs and unions across Africa. I led the design and implementation of a model that enables access to finance where traditional credit infrastructure does not reach. Instead of working around the absence of conventional collateral, I built alternative credit modalities grounded in cooperative behaviour, transaction data and membership structures: viable pathways to capital for communities and institutions formal finance has long excluded.
Doctoral research: AI for non-collateral credit. That hands-on experience became the foundation of my doctoral research. In my DBA graduation project, I examined how artificial intelligence can solve one of the most persistent barriers to economic growth in developing markets: MSMEs cannot access finance because they cannot offer collateral. I built an intelligent decision-support tool that applies AI to non-collateral credit assessment, combining real market data with an ethical framework designed to produce the right decision, not just a fast one.
The tool is not meant to replace human judgement. It is built to enhance it, streamlining the intelligence layer within the financial ecosystem so that credit decisions are made faster, more fairly and with greater confidence. The result is a body of work that bridges academia, technology and lived market experience across three continents.
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For partnerships, advisory mandates, or strategic discussions, I welcome direct conversations.
rehabeldin@gmail.com