From WhatsApp's data org to Google Suggest, YouTube and Careem.

Wael Salloum has built AI infrastructure used by billions. In this episode he unpacks how AI is really adopted inside companies, how to lead senior technical teams, and where MENA's AI moment is heading.

In this episode:
How Wael scaled WhatsApp's data organisation from 4 to 200+ people globally

• What CEOs still get wrong about building data-driven organisations
  
  
• Where companies waste the most money in AI transformations
  
  
• The privacy vs personalisation debate and what WhatsApp actually did
  
  
• The AI belief almost nobody in Silicon Valley agrees with him on
  
  

Guest: Wael Salloum | former Head of Data at WhatsApp, data and AI leader at Google, YouTube and Careem

Connect with Wael:
LinkedIn: / waelsalloum

Subscribe ‪@BreakingDownBarrierspodX‬
Powered by ‪@saltdigital‬ | welovesalt.com

Connect with Ricci Putnam:
LinkedIn: / ricci-putnam

Walid Omar has built products and teams at Dropbox, Snapchat, DoorDash, and now HungerStation, shaping some of the most admired tech cultures in the world.

From scaling creator tools to designing merchant ecosystems, he’s spent his career turning product theory into products that win, and teams that win bigger.

In this episode, we go back to basics to uncover the operating system of high-performance product leadership.

- When does a PM stop shipping and start leading?
- How do you build elite product culture across geographies and business models?
- What skills will every PM need in the AI era?

Breaking Down Barriers - Hosted by Ricci Putnam, Chief Growth Officer @saltdigital

We cover:

• The barrier that changed everything in Walid’s career
• Building product culture at Dropbox, Snapchat, DoorDash, and HungerStation
• High-performance teams and the basics that actually scale
• Solving the right problems, shipping fast, and empowering teams
• C-suite lessons: clarity, alignment, and elite PM behaviours
• AI in MENA: which sectors will fail, which will thrive, and how product teams adapt
• Personal inflection points and leadership lessons you won’t find on LinkedIn

This episode is for PMs, founders, and product leaders who want to stop running and start shaping, 10x their teams, and build products that last.

Kristjan Kaar has been behind some of Europe’s most important fintech products.

From helping build OakNorth, one of the UK’s most successful AI-driven digital banks, to redefining SME finance at Finom, Kristjan has spent his career operating at the edge of product, regulation, and intelligent finance.

In this episode, we unpack what it really takes to build financial products people trust. Without slowing down.

• How do you move fast in regulated environments?
• Is trust more powerful than speed?
• And will AI replace product managers — or make them indispensable?

Breaking Down Barriers — Hosted by Ricci Putnam, Chief Growth Officer @saltdigital

We cover:

• Building AI-powered financial products that scale trust
• Lessons from OakNorth’s hyper-growth as an “intelligent bank”
• Product–engineering alignment in regulated environments
• What founders get wrong when hiring their first CPO
• Scaling product teams without killing innovation
• AI hype vs reality in fintech today
• How European fintech differs from Silicon Valley models
• The future of AI-powered banking and product leadership

This episode is for founders, CPOs, and product leaders building in complexity. Where speed matters, trust is non-negotiable, and culture decides everything.

Stake has quietly become one of the most powerful fintech + real estate platforms in the world.

• 1M+ users.
• AED 1.3B+ in transactions.
• 250,000+ investments across 500+ properties.
• AED 50M+ in rental income paid out.
• Now expanding across the US, KSA, and beyond.

In this episode, we sit down with Manar Mahmassani, Co-Founder & CEO, and Ricardo Brizido, Co-Founder & CTPO of Stake to unpack how they built a category-defining product, navigated brutal regulation, engineered trust at scale, and are reshaping global real-estate ownership through tokenisation and digital assets.

We go deep on product strategy, liquidity design and what it really takes to scale a regulated platform to millions of users.

Breaking Down Barriers - Hosted by Ricci Putnam, Chief Growth Officer ‪ ⁨@saltdigital⁩

We cover:

• Is real estate finally becoming liquid?
• Can tokenisation unlock global access to institutional assets?
• What does the future of property ownership actually look like?
• How Stake reached AED 1.3B invested and 50M+ in rental payouts.
• Balancing regulation, user experience, and financial reliability.
• What decentralised, global property fintech means for investors and renters.
• Plans, innovations, and what the growth trajectory reveals.
• How scaling fintech with real estate differs from traditional startups.

Subscribe now to hear more stories from founders building at scale, and learn the secrets behind the platforms shaping the future of money and property.

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.