Faraz is the CEO of noon, the region's leading consumer commerce platform. The noon ecosystem of services now includes marketplaces for food delivery, grocery, quick-commerce, fintech, and fashion. Faraz is an engineer by training and has an MBA from the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania. Prior to noon, Faraz was the co-founder and Managing Director at Namshi.

Ahmed Gaber has more than two decades of experience in financial services. In 2022, Ahmed joined the ENTERTAINER as the Chief Revenue Officer – Corporate.

In a short span of time, Ahmed made great strides within the B2B department. His visionary perspective has led him to his latest success – as the newly appointed CEO at the ENTERTAINER. He is a skilled negotiator who is well-known for developing lasting commercial partnerships. Ahmed’s innate ability to build high-performance teams, including his strategically selected executive management staff, has served as a growth catalyst and infused productive energy into the workplace.

Prior to the ENTERTAINER, Ahmed was the General Manager of Visa's operations in North Africa where he was responsible for developing the digital payments industry across numerous markets with a special focus on enabling digital commerce, launching EMV acceptance and issuing, rolling out financial inclusion programs and helping governments implement digital payment programs. He has over 21 years of experience in the GCC and MENA region and has led markets across 11 different countries – including Morocco, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Oman, Bahrain, and others.

Ahmed holds a Bachelor of Electronics and Communications Engineering from the Arab Academy for Science and Technology that he obtained in 2000. He also attended more than 25 courses in leadership, sales, and strategy. Additionally, Ahmed attended Strategic Business Management, a Harvard University course, and the Visa Leadership Program in partnership with INSEAD to lead and manage teams.

Strategist, driven and passionate - Born and raised in Karachi, Pakistan, Madiha has led a versatile and ambitious career over the years across finance, tech and media. Madiha pursued her university education in the United States, graduating from Harvard University with a degree in History & Literature. She then headed various positions in New York, Karachi and Dubai.

Madiha joined Careem three years ago and has taken on several roles across the company’s services

She started out as Head of Merchants for the Food business, launched the Shops and Delivery products and businesses, led a cross-functional effort to launch the Careem Super App, and headed partnerships to bring third-party apps onto the Super App. She now holds the position of Vice President for Careem Pay.

Through her career, Madiha has led an expansive portfolio of strategy, execution and management roles in leading companies. Her professional background includes investment banking and management consulting at McKinsey in the US, global corporate strategy at banks like Lehman Brothers and JPMorgan, and heading strategic initiatives for 21st Century Fox’s media JV in the region. Furthermore, Madiha still found some time to indulge her passion for writing and politics as a current affairs journalist in Pakistan.

Through her career, Madiha has led an expansive portfolio of strategy, execution and management roles in leading companies. Her professional background includes investment banking and management consulting at McKinsey in the US, global corporate strategy at banks like Lehman Brothers and JPMorgan, and heading strategic initiatives for 21st Century Fox’s media JV in the region. Furthermore, Madiha still found some time to indulge her passion for writing and politics as a current affairs journalist in Pakistan.

Careem is the everyday Super App for the greater Middle East region. A pioneer of the region’s ride-hailing economy, Careem provides a host of daily services that people need to move around, order things, and transfer money in one unified smartphone app. Careem’s mission is to simplify and improve the lives of people and build an awesome organization that inspires. Established in July 2012, Careem operates in over 100 cities across 13 countries and has created more than one million income-generating opportunities in the region. Careem became a wholly-owned subsidiary of Uber Technologies, Inc. in January 2020. www.careem.com

E-mail: careem@atteline.com

Kelvin Tan is the Global Lead for Standard Chartered nexus,a Banking-as-a-Service proposition. Based in Singapore, Kelvin has been leading the build of the white-label plug and play banking solution with a vision to redefine the banking experience for customers globally by digitally marrying ecosystems to banks.The first market is Indonesia, where the Bank has announced two partners, Bukalapak and Sociolla,with further plans to expand in the region.

Kelvin has been featured on global publications such as BBC and Forbes.Kelvinhas spoken at key engagements internationally, such as Finovate Asia, Singapore FinTech Festival, and IBF.

Kelvin has held multiple roles in the bank ranging from Transaction Banking to Retail Products and Payments to Strategic Programmes, between 2012 and 2018. In those roles, he has led cross functional, cross border teams to deliver multiple capabilities for the bank including Apple Pay, Samsung Pay and Google Pay in multiple locales and the MyWay program (Singapore’s first silver generation targeted product programme).

Prior to that, Kelvin has held multiple roles in multiple organisations and industries. His roles have spanned consumer finance, transaction banking and FMCG, covering product, analytics, business management and research. He has worked in Singapore, Indonesia and Thailand.

Kelvin holds an M.A from the Committee in International Relations from the University of Chicago, and a BA (Hons) in Politics and International Studies from Murdoch University.

Alessandro is Senior Vice President Strategy and Corporate Development at STARZPLAY, the leading premium SVOD in MENA, headquartered in Abu Dhabi. In his role, Alessandro is in charge of equity/debt fundraise, M&A, investor relations as well as defining the company long-term strategy in partnership with the company’s strategic shareholders. Before STARZPLAY, Alessandro served as Principal at Delta Partners Capital, an early-stage & growth capital fund based in UAE and investing across emerging markets. Over his career, Alessandro has been involved in >30 deals and served in multiple boards including that of STARZPLAY. Prior to that, Alessandro spent several years travelling across Africa and Middle East advising telcos and media companies on multiple strategic matters with focus on mobile financial services strategy and implementation. Alessandro has a MSc in finance from Bocconi university, has lived in Italy, South Africa and USA and currently based in UAE with his family

Neeraj is a hands-on Chief Executive Officer (CEO) with expertise in product development, operations, insurance, and the FinTech industry. Through strategic foresight, drive, and determination, he built a strong foundation for his successful multi-million dollar company within a short span of time.

In 2018, Neerajwas entrusted with the task of setting upPolicybazaar.ae to fill what the PB Fintech group saw as a void in financial aggregation space. Today Policybazaar.ae has grown from a one-man start-up to a 400+ strong organisation with over 100K insurance policies sold each year.Neeraj envisions fostering a behavioral change in the UAE relating to how finances and social security is perceived in the region by the masses and promote digital channel as the preferred medium for the consumers when managing personal finance.Furthermore, he seeks to rejuvenate the FinTech ecosystem in the state by offering a robust alternative to traditional methodologies through Policybazaar.ae.

As a leader and self-sufficient innovator, Neeraj is comfortable in any role from the executive boardroom to the operations floor. He is a savvy negotiator known for strong business development and relationship building skills. Neeraj's innate ability to build high-performance teams, including his strategically-selected senior management staff, has served as a growth catalyst and infused productive energy into the workplace.

Prior to his elevation as the CEO of Policybazaar UAE, he is credited to building the Car Insurance business for the flagship venture Policybazaar.com in India.

Ryaan Sharif is BA (Econ) graduate, majoring in finance, from the University of Manchester

Upon graduating, Ryaan went on to work for EY working on numerous engagements with multinational firms, to the investment promotion agency of the Kingdom of Bahrain personally account managed and attracted US$300 million in foreign direct investment and finally working in Venture Capital for the likes of Batelco where he headed the B2C Investments in the Digital Development Department responsible for deploying US$500 million, as a strategic investor, into high growth digital companies.

Ryaan is currently the GM of Flat6Labs Abu Dhabi who have launched a US$32 million fund in partnership with ADQ, the sovereign wealth fund of Abu Dhabi, that will aim at initially investing in 60 startups over the next three years

Nour is an expert in embedded finance and Banking as a Service (BaaS), where he is responsible for growing BaaS in the MEA region by helpingfinancial institutions and consumer brandsopen up entirely new revenue streamsthroughembedded finance and BaaS. He has a wealth of knowledge in this space, having built his 18-year career with leading global consultancies and financial services firms.

Prior to Finastra, Nour held roles at Bain & Company, EY, and PwC. He has worked in several countries, including the UAE, KSA, Qatar, Oman, New Zealand, and Australia. Most recently, he was an Associate Partner at IBM Consulting in Dubai, where he advised Financial Services CIOs and CDOs on various technology & digital topics.

Nour is an Advisor to the New Zealand Government (NZ Trade and Enterprise) on technology-related matters in the Middle East.

He has a Master’s degree from London Business School, in addition to a Master’s in Information Systems, and a degree in Computer Science, both from the University of Auckland.

Ahmad Coucha is the founder and CEO of FlapKap, the first and leading Revenue Based Financing Platform in the MENA region. Prior to founding FlapKap, Coucha was the co-founder and CFO at GP&K, holding group of Good People and Kijamii, one of MENA’s largest and most awarded independent advertising networks.

An innovative digital disruptor and experienced leader in the Fintech industry, Jayesh Patel plays a pivotal role in establishing an entirely new virtual banking landscape for the Middle East.

As CEO of Wio Bank PJSC, Jayesh is shaping the platform bank as an intelligent financial partner for businesses and customers. He brings a wealth of experience to Wio, building it as a truly open platform that will provide solutions in three areas - Digital banking apps, Embedded finance and Banking-as-a-Service solutions.

Throughout his 14 years in the Fintech industry, Jayesh has been driven by a vision to digitise growth and consolidate services to simplify banking for everyone. He has worked with Fortune 500 clients at Deloitte and IBM in the US, focusing on innovation and building on-demand digital solutions, before driving the development and launch of Liv. By Emirates NBD, where he oversaw the creation of its online finance ecosystem.

Before this, Jayesh was Head of Retail Strategy at Emirates NBD where he led the digitisation of essential customer services and processes. Jayesh is also an active member of the Angel investment community in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA).

Wio is the region’s first platform bank created to reboot banking for everyone and open new paths for its customers. Headquartered in Abu Dhabi, Wio is owned by the Abu Dhabi Holding Company (ADQ), Alpha Dubai, Etisalat, and First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB).

Vikrant leads our business in Middle East & North Africa (MENA) region and is the CEO of United Bank for Africa Plc (DIFC Branch) in Dubai. He has had a distinguished banking career of over 25 years working in Sub-Saharan Africa, United Kingdom, MENA and India.

Prior to joining us, he worked for DIFC Authority (Government of Dubai), as Chief Representative - International Markets. His banking & financial markets career included roles as Regional Head of Institutional Sales, Sub Saharan Africa at Standard Chartered Bank, Prior to which he was Managing Director, at Société Générale in London where he was responsible for the banks MENA regional expansion strategy.

Vikrant has also held senior management positions with Morgan Stanley in London; Citigroup in London, Dubai and Bahrain; HSBC in India; and Arthur Andersen & Co. in India.

Vikrant holds an LLB, Bachelor of Law degree and is a Chartered Financial Analyst from the CFA Institute in USA. He also qualified as a Chartered Accountant from the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India, where he ranked 18th in the All-India Merit list. He was also empanelled as a consultant for IFC (World Bank Group) and serves on other Boards as an Independent Non-Executive Director

Abe Karar is the Chief Product & Strategy Officer at Fintech Galaxy, where he guides the development of new products, processes, technologies and management information systems to drive business performance, client engagement and operational excellence.

With over 15 years of experience in the Financial Services industry, Abe has worked at some of the largest Financial institutions in the world, including BMO Bank of Montreal, JP Morgan Chase, Bank of America, First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB) and Arab Financial Services (AFS). He has held various leadership roles across Digital, Retail, Card, Operations, Customer Experience, Business Analytics, AML and Risk Strategies.

Abe's expertise range from executing large-scale transformational initiatives across key strategic enterprise programs (+$200M), developing and implementing operational controls and action plans, and transforming strategic plans into business solutions that streamline business processes, improve customer experience, mitigate risks, reduce costs, increase productivity ratio and enhance overall ROI.

Abe holds an MBA and a degree in Applied Mathematics, and has taught Corporate Performance Management, amongst other courses, at the triple-accredited Telfer professional MBA program, at the University of Ottawa

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. His key areas of specialization include product innovation, design, and fintech partnerships in the fields of digital payments, financial inclusion, and eCommerce

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’.

A man conquering the world with many ‘firsts’, key highlights of his career include launching Emirates Airlines’ first consumer-facing application, building Canada’s first wireless machine with Coca-Cola, and also launching Canada’s first cloud-based hotel management system. He also created Visa Luxury Hotels (www.visaluxuryhotels.com), and co-founded Backyard Travel (www.backyardtravel.com), adding more wins under his belt.

During his tenure, Sameer led Innovation, Partnerships and Design for the CEMEA region; marked by his significant contribution to Visa's fintech fast track program - mentoring, incubating, and accelerating new entrants in the CEMEA region.

More recently, Poonja has been involved in establishing a new growth strategy for Entertainer, and if you ask Sameer about his accomplishments, he will say that he’s only playing the infinite game, where there is no finish line and no losers. As a man who started his career at the age of 16, with over 20 years of experience, he believes in amplifying stories over titles - which he continues to seize by sharing his knowledge as a licensed teacher.

An avid sports fan, Sameer religiously follows ice hockey and football; activities that he now enjoys even more by instilling a passion for them in his two children. With 110 countries under his belt, Sameer and his family are a foodie bunch, willing to travel across the world for that ‘perfect meal’.

His motto in life takes inspiration from Steve Jobs who said, “Stay hungry, Stay foolish”