Perhaps three days in Riyadh alone will not be enough to judge the success of the new edition of the “Money20/20 Middle East” conference or other huge global conferences. The actual test begins after the participants leave and several questions are asked:
Have meetings turned into clients? Have financing talks progressed? Have international companies decided to enter the Saudi market? Have local companies used the relationships they built to move into new markets?
These are the standards that Annabelle Mander, Executive Vice President of Tahaluf, sets in an exclusive interview with Asharq Al-Awsat when answering the long-term economic role of major international events, avoiding considering attendance or the number of meetings as sufficient evidence of impact.
Riyadh will host “Money20/20 Middle East” from September 14 to 16, 2026, which comes a few weeks after hosting the “LEAP 2026” conference in late August and before the Saudi capital also prepares for the tenth session of the “Future Investment Initiative” from October 26 to 29. These and other major events put various sectors, from technology and financial services to investment and metals, on the growing agenda of international conferences in Riyadh.
From “acquaintance” to a commercial outcome
Mander says that the most important signs following these events were the continuation of some conversations after the end of the conference in terms of continued meetings of founders with investors, to companies starting to explore partnerships, as well as continued communication between parts of the industry and regulators.
But she warns against exaggerating the attribution of deal outcomes to the event itself. The platform may bring two parties together, or help an existing discussion to advance more quickly, but it is the companies that are in charge of negotiating and completing the investment or partnership.
Therefore, counting meetings does not answer the most important question. One meeting can lead to entering a new market, while dozens of meetings may end without a commercial outcome. According to Mander, the measurement becomes linked to how the relationship moves from an initial presentation to an investment discussion, a potential partnership, or a market entry plan, and then to what the parties can later confirm about the outcome.
The actual customer is an indicator of growth
This logic is also reflected in the way of measuring the development of the Saudi financial technology system. The investment round is not the only indicator, and it may not always be the most important indicator.
Mander places at the forefront of the indicators for the company obtaining customers who pay for the service, converting a pilot experiment into an actually working service, establishing local teams, and winning Saudi companies business outside the Kingdom.
She points out that obtaining a fintech company's first major banking client may be just as important as a financing round, because it provides direct evidence of the existence of demand and gives the company a base from which it can launch into broader growth.
The criteria also include jobs and knowledge transfer, especially when expertise remains within the market and turns into capabilities for local teams. Over several cycles, Mander suggests looking at whether participating companies employ more, serve more customers, and enter additional markets.
The need for more than one investor
One of the difficulties of growing fintech companies is that financing alone does not solve all the obstacles. At the same moment, a company may need a banking client, a business partner, a licensing understanding, a distribution channel, and additional capital. In this sense, Mander believes that the potential value of bringing banks, investors, regulators and startups together in one place comes from the ability to have several types of conversations in parallel, rather than from having a conference itself.
She explains that international financial and technology companies considering entering the Saudi market may use these meetings to understand potential customers, partners, and operational requirements, while Saudi companies can communicate with investors or partners outside the Kingdom.
Dialogue does not mean changing policy
One area where the impact of conferences can be overstated is their role in regulation, especially in a financial sector subject to stringent requirements. That's why Mander draws a clear distinction here: regulators are the ones who make policy and licensing decisions, while meetings with companies and banks can help better define the problem.
A company founder may see that a certain requirement hinders the launch of his product, while a bank sees it as a problem with technical integration, while the regulator needs more evidence about customer protection. Comparing these perceptions may identify questions that require further work, but it does not necessarily mean that the dialogue will lead to organizational change.
Four areas of broader Saudi opportunity
Beyond the event itself, Mander identifies business-to-business payments, open banking, blended finance, and Sharia-compliant fintech among areas that she sees as opportunities for Saudi Arabia to build an international presence.
B2B payments link businesses to everyday issues such as managing cash flows, collecting payments, and obtaining financing, needs that are not limited to the Saudi market and can give the local producer room to expand.
In Sharia-compliant financial technology, it sees potential to develop products targeting users in international markets, provided that it combines financial innovation with an understanding of the requirements of this segment. The rule it sets for external expansion is that the company begins by solving a problem in a strong way in the local market, but from the product development stage it thinks about the possibility of using it outside of it.
Tokenized assets are closer to the market
When moving to emerging technologies, Mander distinguishes between tokenized assets, programmable money, and self-financing. She says tokenized assets have the clearest near-term path to commercial adoption in the region, especially in specific institutional applications whose economic benefit can be demonstrated. It also sees potential in programmable money to improve payment execution and settlement, but links the proliferation of these solutions to reliable architecture, regulatory clarity, and enough business benefit to drive customers to change the systems already in use.
As for “self-financing,” you approach it with more caution, because automating a specific task is different from allowing an independent system to make complex financial decisions, where questions of responsibility and trust become more difficult. She adds that the commercial difference in the end is not the newness of the technology, but rather its ability to solve a real problem with a reliability that makes customers use it repeatedly.
Limits of international expansion
The same equation applies to Saudi financial technology companies seeking to expand outside the Kingdom. Success locally provides a starting point, but each market carries different customer expectations, regulatory requirements, purchasing mechanisms and distribution relationships. According to Mander, companies need clear customers, local partners and teams that know the market, as well as developing governance, compliance and customer service capabilities in parallel with growth.
Capital allocated for expansion must also take into account the time required to establish a sustainable business operation, rather than treating the establishment of an entity in a new country as the end point. Mander sums it up clearly by saying that entry into the market is a milestone, but the ability to win repeat business is the real test.
Test 2028
Mander places 2028 as the date at which it can be assessed whether the event has become a real part of the Saudi fintech ecosystem. She points out that by then it should be possible to show companies that have acquired clients, advanced their investments, entered Saudi Arabia, or expanded internationally as a result of relationships developed through “Money20/20 Middle East.” It is also expected that companies will appear returning to the event at a different stage than their first participation. For example, a founder who became the owner of a company that employed more, or an international company that expanded its Saudi team, or a banking relationship that turned into an existing service.
But this goal in turn sets a standard that can be tested. To say that an international event has become part of the infrastructure of the financial technology sector requires more than international presence and media momentum. It also requires proof that the relationships initiated continued thereafter and produced observable business activity.
The “UNESCO Global Forum on Artificial Intelligence Ethics 2026,” which Riyadh will host next week, will discuss building regulatory and ethical frameworks for the safe and responsible use of artificial intelligence. With the aim of ensuring the protection of human rights in the digital world.
The attention of the international community is directed towards the forum, which is sponsored by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), during the period from September 14 to 17, for the first time in the Arab region, with the participation of ministers and officials concerned with technology and artificial intelligence, policy makers, leaders of major international companies, and representatives of international organizations.
The Forum coincides with a period in which artificial intelligence applications are accelerating and their effects are expanding in the economy, education, health, media, labor market and other sectors, which raises the need for international rules that achieve a balance between unleashing the potential of innovation and protecting people and their rights.
Issues of algorithmic bias, discrimination, safety, privacy, and the digital divide top the list of challenges that require international cooperation, especially with the varying ability of countries and societies to develop and benefit from these technologies, which are reshaping various aspects of life, economy, and society.
This international event comes in light of a global crisis of confidence afflicting major artificial intelligence technology companies, and with it an escalating wave of resignations among senior researchers and developers, most notably the researcher specializing in model training, Jacob Cookson from Anthropic.
In a post that sparked widespread controversy, Cookson warned that Anthropic and OpenAI, for which he worked, “are racing to launch a super-artificial intelligence that trains itself, and is gambling with all of our lives.”
The publication highlighted the existential risks resulting from the intense race between technology giants, the absence of binding regulatory frameworks, and the pressures that make safety compromises almost inevitable.
Through more than 30 specialized sessions and workshops, the forum is scheduled to devote a wide space to discussing these challenges, formulating recommendations to provide an ethical work environment that protects scientists and human societies, and employing artificial intelligence to serve sustainable development and enhance the prosperity of societies, while preserving human rights, freedoms and dignity.
About 100 speakers, experts and policy makers from around the world, will discuss key topics, including: artificial intelligence ethics and governance, capacity building, responsible innovation, and international policies. They will also review the latest global initiatives and experiences through high-level sessions and specialized workshops.
It is noteworthy that the forum is co-organized by the Saudi Data and Artificial Intelligence Authority (SDAIA), in partnership with the International Center for Artificial Intelligence Research and Ethics (ICAIRE), and in coordination with the Saudi National Commission for Education, Culture and Science.
Hosting Riyadh gives the forum a broader space to discuss issues related to the governance of artificial intelligence, by bringing together representatives of governments, international organizations, the private sector, and the research community on one platform, to exchange experiences, discuss challenges, and ways to build international consensus on the responsible use of these technologies.
The forum's activities are divided into more than 30 specialized sessions and workshops, to discuss how to align the speed of technical development with safety and responsibility requirements, and enhance the ability of countries to benefit from artificial intelligence in a fair and sustainable manner.
The outcomes of the forum, whose results are awaited by 194 countries, gain special importance in light of the need for policies that do not stop at national borders, but rather establish common foundations for dealing with artificial intelligence, support the fair distribution of its benefits, enhance the readiness of countries and societies, and contribute to reducing the digital divide.
Hosting reflects the growing Saudi role in the global dialogue on artificial intelligence and its ethics, and supporting international efforts aimed at promoting responsible and ethical use of it, in a way that enhances the benefit of its technologies to serve people and societies and achieve sustainable development goals, in light of the amazing progress the country is witnessing in the field to achieve the goals of “Saudi Vision 2030.”
Deloitte's numbers show a clear gap between the spread of artificial intelligence and its ability so far to actually change the way organizations work. In the Middle East, 66 percent of organizations say they have achieved efficiency gains thanks to AI technologies, but only 34 percent have fundamentally redesigned their products, processes, or business models. Even more telling is that 84 percent have not yet designed jobs or workflows around these technologies.
According to officials at Deloitte Middle East, this gap between “use” and “reconstruction” constitutes the next stage of the artificial intelligence journey in Saudi Arabia. The issue is no longer related to the number of experiments or the strength of the models used, as much as it is related to how to redesign the institutions themselves, at a time when the Kingdom has a different advantage from many markets in the presence of new projects and institutions whose operational, supervisory and security structures can be built from scratch.
In an exclusive interview with Asharq Al-Awsat, Youssef Barqawi, partner and leader of the “AI Growth” platform and member of the Board of Directors at “Deloitte Middle East,” said that the discussion he observed during the “LEAP 2026” conference has changed significantly. Instead of asking about the number of artificial intelligence projects or the size of models, leaders are now discussing how to redesign the operating model, build “original artificial intelligence” institutions, and expand its use while maintaining trust and sovereignty.
Rebuilding the way you work
Barqawi believes that achieving productivity gains represents the relatively easiest stage of adopting artificial intelligence, while the most difficult value begins when the organization uses technology to rethink the way it creates value, serves customers and citizens, and competes.
He points out that this transformation becomes more complex with the rise of “agent artificial intelligence,” as the technology is no longer limited to automating a single task, but rather has become capable of planning, coordinating, and executing work that extends across more than one function, which forces a reconsideration of work processes, decision-making powers, and the relationship between employees and smart systems.
He gives the example of an AI agent that not only answers a customer's query, but understands the request, collects information from multiple systems, coordinates next steps, raises exceptions, and completes the process with human intervention only at the required points. In a large organization, one such path can cross the functions of sales, customer service, finance, marketing, logistics, and risk management.
Thus, the organizational challenge becomes almost equal to the technical challenge, as the ability of systems to move between functions increases, the feasibility of traditional vertical structures in which each department operates separately becomes less useful.
A Saudi advantage in “starting from scratch”
The Saudi difference, according to Barqawi, is evident in the nature of the question posed by many new institutions. In other markets, the discussion revolves around how to introduce artificial intelligence into an existing organization, while some Saudi projects can start from a different question: How would the organization itself be designed if it were being built today for the age of artificial intelligence?
This is an important point in green projects and new mega projects in the Kingdom, because it allows the data, governance, cybersecurity, and operating model to be designed within a single architecture, rather than adding artificial intelligence later on top of old systems and procedures.
In Barqawi’s opinion, this approach can make the organization more able to adapt and expand as technology develops, because artificial intelligence becomes part of the decision-making process, operation, and customer experience, and not a separate technical project.
He also points out that the opportunity by 2030 will not be limited to one sector, as the impact, in his opinion, will appear at the intersections of sectors, such as supply chains that reset themselves in real time, infrastructure that anticipates the need for maintenance before breakdowns occur, hospitals that coordinate patient care proactively, and government services that anticipate the needs of the beneficiary instead of simply responding to them.
Sovereignty goes beyond where the data is stored
Another shift that Deloitte sees is the expansion of the concept of sovereignty in artificial intelligence. Whereas the debate was largely focused on where data resided, it now extends to control over strategy, infrastructure, models, governance, and critical capabilities.
Barqawi reports that, in his view, Saudi Arabia does not deal with sovereignty and global cooperation as two conflicting paths, but rather combines investment in local infrastructure, sovereign talent and capabilities, and partnerships with global technology companies. But this equation becomes more complex when organizations move from traditional applications to autonomous or semi-autonomous systems, and when artificial intelligence connects directly to physical equipment and infrastructure.
What does in-country backup mean?
From a different angle, Michael Massad, emerging cyber technologies partner at Deloitte Middle East, warns against confusing compliance with sovereignty requirements with having true operational flexibility.
He said during an exclusive interview with Asharq Al-Awsat that having a backup copy inside the country remains important, but it alone does not guarantee business continuity. If the two environments are exposed to the same malfunction or cyber incident, or both rely on the same provider, the vulnerability remains shared. Hence, it is considered that Saudi institutions need to determine in advance what must remain within the Kingdom, what can be copied in a controlled manner, and what can be temporarily transferred to other environments upon failure within the approved rules, with these decisions being decided from the design stage.
