Dr. Bilal Baloch - Previous co-founder of an AI startup and managing a half-billion-dollar fund - is sharing how he’s rewriting the rules of venture capital in MENA.

Breaking Down Barriers - Hosted by Ricci Putnam, Chief Growth Officer
Powered by Salt: ‪@saltdigital‬ | welovesalt.com

In this conversation, Bilal breaks down:

• How sovereign funds and government policy are rewriting the venture playbook
• Why the next global AI companies won’t all come from Silicon Valley.
• How capital, compute, talent, and geopolitics are now inseparable.
• Why the UAE, KSA, and emerging markets are no longer “followers” but shapers.
• What founders need to understand about institutions, not just models.
• The first 90 days with a portfolio company and when to double down
• Why storytelling beats data in pitches and the talent gaps slowing growth
• Where real AI value will accrue: infrastructure, models, or vertical apps
• Quick-fire insights on founders, buzzwords, and risk in today’s markets
• His vision for MENA tech in 2030

Founders, investors, and innovators - get an inside look at the strategies shaping the region’s next unicorns.

Fernando Fanton scaled Monzo to 10M users, helped Just Eat hit an $8B exit, grew Mendeley’s user base 4x, and is now shaping the future of Property Finder with AI-powered home search across the MENA region.

Hear how he breaks barriers in product, scales teams fast, and shares bold predictions for AI and MENA’s tech future.

Is trust more powerful than speed in a product? Can AI replace designers and PMs? Fernando Fanton answers these and more, sharing lessons from Monzo, Just Eat, and Property Finder to help you break barriers in product leadership.


We cover:

• How Monzo scaled to 10M users
• Why Just Eat won (and why it wasn’t luck)
• The truth about product culture, discovery & delivery
• The biggest mistakes founders make hiring CPOs
• AI’s future impact on product teams
• Why most products fail and how to fix it
• His bold predictions for MENA tech over the next 5 years

Timestamps:

00:00 - Trailer
00:18 - Who is Fernando Fanton?
02:41 - The biggest barrier he broke early in his career
06:10 - Scaling Mendeley 4x and early ML lessons
11:48 - Inside Just Eat’s $8B acquisition
17:30 - 1M orders vs 1M customers — which is harder?
21:55 - Building Monzo’s product engine to 10M users
28:44 - Why most product teams lose focus
33:12 - Discovery, experimentation & iteration: the Monzo way
39:20 - The one mistake founders make hiring product leaders
43:55 - AI’s real impact on product teams (not hype)
51:30 - How to scale product orgs without breaking culture
57:10 - The hardest decision he’s made as a leader
1:02:22 - MENA tech predictions for the next 5 years
1:07:40 - When should a founder hire their first CPO?
1:12:00 - The un-Googleable moment in Fernando’s career
1:16:02 - The next barrier Fernando wants to break
1:18:55 - Quickfire: Speed or trust? AI prototype or customer?
1:21:00 - Final message for the audience

In this episode of Breaking Down Barriers, Fernando reveals the real playbook behind hyper-growth products - the decisions, culture, philosophy, and hard barriers that most teams never talk about publicly.

Make sure to like, comment and subscribe to hear more great stories for some of the top product and tech leaders in the ecosystem.

Product Scaling in Fintech: How Sarwa Built a Multi-Product Wealth Platform with Robin Harb

Today’s guest is Robin Harb, Chief Product Officer at Sarwa, one of the Middle East’s fastest-growing fintech platforms.

Robin went from McKinsey consultant to leading Sarwa’s product team and scaling it from a single robo-advisor to a multi-product wealth platform that handles stocks, crypto, ETFs, and options and achieving over AED 15 billion in trading volume.

In this episode, Robin shares:

- How to scale fintech products fast without breaking the team

- Designing for first-time investors and building trust in wealthtech

- Lessons from a product decision that didn’t go as planned

- The future of AI in fintech and what products the MENA region still needs

- Advice for product leaders, founders, and C-suite executives

If you’re a founder, operator, or product leader in MENA fintech, this episode is packed with actionable insights you won’t want to miss.

Timestamps:

0:00 – Intro

1:05 – Robin’s career journey: McKinsey → CPO

4:30 – Scaling Sarwa from robo-advisor → multi-product

9:15 – Product strategy & roadmap evolution

13:50 – Regional fintech challenges in MENA

17:40 – Lessons from failed product decisions

21:30 – AI & the future of wealthtech

25:10 – Rapid fire & executive takeaways

28:00 – Closing thoughts

Like, subscribe, and hit the bell to catch more insights from MENA’s top leaders.

Orchestrating Hyper-Growth Product Teams to Build a Fintech Unicorn in the Age of AI

Katya was in the room from day one at Tabby - helping scale the product and tech teams from just 7 people to over 300, and building one of MENA’s most successful fintechs, now valued at $4.5 billion.

As Ex-Chief Product Officer, she reveals how to:

• Scale a product organisation from startup to unicorn
• Build a culture that can handle hyper-growth
• Use AI to accelerate delivery and decision-making
• Balance OKRs, performance, and alignment at scale
• Lead remote-first teams across multiple time zones
• Know when to restructure, hire externally, or promote within

This episode dives deep into what it takes to orchestrate hyper-growth, design high-performing teams, and build in the age of AI - lessons every founder, product leader, and operator in emerging markets should hear.

Timestamps:

00:00 - Introduction

02:45 - How Tabby built its first product team

06:30 - Scaling from 7 to 300 people

10:10 - The art of OKRs & alignment in fast growth

15:40 - Remote-first at unicorn speed

20:55 - Where GenAI boosts team velocity

25:00 - Leadership mistakes & lessons learned

If you’re building or scaling a product-led company don’t miss this one.

Subscribe for more conversations with top founders, investors, and operators in tech, fintech, and AI.

The Digital Banking Playbook: Lessons from Launching Digital Banks in the UK, UAE & Saudi Arabia

How do you build a digital bank from scratch across three countries, three regulators, and three very different ecosystems?

In this episode of The Digital Banking Playbook, we sit down with an expert who’s spent the past 8.5 years building three digital banks in the UK, UAE, and Saudi Arabia and holding C-Suite roles such as Chief Operating Officer, Chief of Staff, and Chief Product Officer.

Our guest has built both retail and SME banks, navigated some of the toughest regulatory landscapes, and learned what truly separates successful digital banks from those that never launch.

Topics Covered:

• The biggest challenges of building a digital bank
• Regulatory differences between the UK, UAE, and KSA
• Why Agile development doesn’t always work for regulated products
• How to balance innovation with compliance
• Building the right team and skill sets for digital banking
• AI in banking — practical applications and implementation hurdles
• The future of banking: Super Apps vs. Embedded Banking

Featured Story: The Blank Cheque Dilemma

When ambition meets unlimited funding what happens next?

Hear how one digital bank’s blank cheque became its downfall, and why disciplined funding gates are critical to any successful fintech build.

Future of Digital Banking:

• The Super App vs. Embedded Banking arms race
• How Open Banking and AI will redefine the customer experience
• Why the “MVP” in banking keeps getting bigger and what that means for founders
• The next category-defining digital bank could emerge within 2–3 years

Key Takeaways:

• Building a bank costs more and takes longer than you think
• Not every fintech needs to become a bank and partnerships can winThere are two phases: the “rails” and the “differentiation”
• Fraud, compliance, and AI governance are the next big frontiers
• Choosing the right jurisdiction is as crucial as the product strategy

Who Should Watch:

• Founders & entrepreneurs exploring fintech and neobank opportunities
• VCs & investors interested in regulated fintech ventures
• Product, tech, and operations leaders building digital financial products
• Anyone passionate about the future of banking and AI

Subscribe to hear more from the leaders shaping the future of fintech, AI, and digital transformation in financial services.

Ecommerce as we know it is disappearing.

The entire landscape of online buying is being rewritten by technology from AI-driven personalisation and live selling to composable commerce and virtual influencers.

In this episode, we break down the death of traditional ecommerce and uncover what’s replacing it.

Our guest has spent over 14 years as a global CIO/CTO across some of the world’s most high-traffic companies in travel, retail, and ecommerce leading teams of 100+ people from 25+ countries, and helping shape the digital strategies of Accenture, Ernst & Young, HBX Group, TUI Travel, and several high-growth startups. A Harvard Alumni and startup investor, he’s lived and worked in 8 countries from South America to the Middle East giving him a truly global view of how technology and buyer behavior are evolving.

💡 In this episode, we explore:

• Why the traditional ecommerce model is collapsing
• How social selling and livestream commerce (like Douyin & TikTok Shop) are changing everything
• Why headless and composable platforms are becoming the new default
• The rise of AI sales agents, virtual influencers, and hyper-personalised experiences
• What SaaS companies must rethink to survive in this new world
• The future of marketplaces like Shopify, Amazon & beyond
• What the next 3–5 years of ecommerce tech will really look like

🔍 Key Questions We Dive Into:

• Are SaaS companies for ecommerce already dead?
• Build or buy and what’s the smarter move today?
• How are buyer expectations changing with AI and personalization?
• What does the next-gen ecommerce experience look like?
• Which technologies are overhyped… and which are the real game changers?
• How should tech and product teams rebuild their mindset for the next era of commerce?

🌍 Current Trends Shaping Ecommerce:

• The explosive growth of social commerce and live selling (led by China & TikTok Shop)
• AI-driven customer engagement through real-time chat, avatars, and virtual agents
• The rise of super commerce apps integrating payments, delivery, and entertainment
• Drone and robot deliveries (JD.com, Meituan, Getir, Gopuff)
• The evolution of digital ecosystems like Amazon Inspire, Roblox, Fortnite, and Nike’s Swoosh

If you’re a founder, product leader, or SaaS builder, this episode will challenge everything you think you know about ecommerce and reveal where the next big opportunities lie.

🎧 Listen now to understand the future of commerce before it happens.

Reimagining Customer Engagement: AI and the Future of Human Connection

AI is transforming how brands connect with customers—but what does the next generation of customer engagement really look like?

In this episode, Karim Zaki, CPO/CTO at Unifonic, shares over 20 years of experience building tech teams, scaling products, and driving innovation across Egypt, the US, KSA, and UAE.

From co-founding startups in chatbots and social media analytics to leading Unifonic’s evolution from CPaaS to an AI-powered engagement platform, Karim breaks down:

• Real impact of AI on customer communication beyond the hype
• Emerging trends redefining brand-customer interactions
• How to lead tech teams and upskill for the AI era
• Lessons from scaling intelligent engagement platforms
• Building customer-centric AI solutions rooted in real business problems

Key Takeaways for Executives & Product Leaders:

• Build with purpose, not hype
• AI should augment, not replace
• Invest in local innovation and talent ecosystems
• Own the customer experience layer and be the platform, not just the product

Tune in to see what the future of customer engagement looks like—and how to start building it today.

Engineering the Future: Building AI-Powered Super Apps in the Middle East

From Silicon Valley to the Middle East, Mohamad has been at the forefront of shaping the future of AI-driven platforms. With a PhD from Stanford, senior roles at Facebook, and now as VP of Product, Data & AI at Careem, he’s helping build one of the region’s most ambitious AI-first super apps.

In this episode, we uncover:

• The evolution of Careem into an AI-first Everything App
• How to scale data, product, and engineering into a multi-service platform
• Lessons from navigating 90% revenue drops during COVID and transforming famine years into growth
• Real-world insights into GenAI, applied AI, and AI agents
• What the future of AI in MENAP looks like – from personalisation to robotics

Whether you’re a founder, investor, or tech leader, this episode gives you an insider’s view on building world-class AI platforms in one of the fastest-growing regions on the planet.

About the Guest

• VP of Product, Data & AI at Careem
• Former Senior Director across Mobility, Data, Platform & AI at Careem
• Ex-Facebook, leading Core ML for business integrity across Instagram, WhatsApp & Messenger
• PhD in Electrical Engineering (Stanford) + MBA (Berkeley Haas)
• Experienced in building & scaling high-performance tech teams across startups, Big Tech, and scale-ups

Chapters you won’t want to miss:

• Careem’s resilient, ambitious culture & super app journey
• The Hope Mission: lessons in leadership, alignment, and championship teams
• GenAI in practice: personalisation, optimisation & customer behaviour shifts
• The challenges of AI in MENAP: data, governance & infrastructure
• Future bets: Everything Agents, AI with memory, and the speed of thought software revolution

Don’t just watch this episode – be part of the conversation shaping the future of AI.