1.  How do you view the positioning of e& enterprise for long-term growth, and what achievements will it build upon?

e& enterprise is uniquely positioned for long-term growth as a comprehensive enabler of digital transformation, not just as a regional technology provider, but as a transformative force in the digital economy. Over the past few years, the company has evolved into a full-spectrum technology and solutions partner for governments, enterprises, and industries. We’ve progressed from connectivity to capability — anchored in strong foundations in infrastructure, cloud, and cybersecurity, while embedding AI, IoT, and data at the centre of our growth model.

The long-term trajectory builds upon three key achievements. First, our success in deploying large-scale digital transformation projects — such as our work with UAE’s federal entities on smart government initiatives — proves our ability to deliver complex, integrated solutions. Second, our strategic acquisition and integration of specialized companies has allowed us to vertically deepen our expertise in cybersecurity, cloud-native development, and industry-specific AI. And third, we’ve successfully cultivated a partner ecosystem that includes global hyperscalers, regional tech startups, and academic institutions, enabling agile innovation.

We are expanding with clear intent — amplifying our capabilities while building on the credibility, scale, and trust that come from being part of the e& Group. This unique blend of institutional strength and entrepreneurial agility is what sets us apart in the market.

Where others specialize in either infrastructure or innovation, we bring both together — delivering intelligent infrastructure that’s engineered for innovation, resilience, and long-term value creation.

Our strength lies in our ability to anticipate where digital is headed — and be there first. As we look ahead, our focus is on scaling through sector specialization, international expansion, and the continued internalization of emerging technologies. This combination of executional maturity and forward-looking innovation ensures e& enterprise is not just future-ready — we’re helping define what that future looks like.
 

2.  Your vision for leading e& enterprise focuses on innovation, flexibility, and a commitment to developing regional and global digital economies. How do we address this? 

We are building e& enterprise as a defining force in the digital economy — a company that architects ecosystems, leads in frontier technologies, and delivers measurable value across sectors and geographies. My vision for e& enterprise is to become a catalytic force in this shift: an orchestrator of digital ecosystems, a trusted transformation partner, and an innovation leader shaping the future of economies. Our approach is multifaceted, focusing on intelligent innovation, agile execution, and inclusive economic impact.​

Innovation for us transcends mere technological advancement; it's about crafting intelligent solutions that address real-world challenges. A testament to this is our establishment of the Generative AI (GenAI) Center of Excellence. In collaboration with esteemed partners and leading hyperscalers, this initiative aims to accelerate the integration of GenAI technologies, develop innovative solutions, and build industry-leading AI tools to support businesses in their digital transformation journeys.

Flexibility is embedded in our operational ethos. We design modular, cloud-native, and interoperable solutions that can scale across industries and geographies. Our recent partnership with AWS exemplifies this adaptability. By investing $1 billion over the next six years, we're set to accelerate cloud-driven innovation and digital transformation across the region. This collaboration not only enhances our service offerings but also includes training and certifying up to 60,000 individuals in cloud technologies and AI, ensuring a skilled workforce ready to meet future demands.

Cybersecurity plays an essential role in this vision. As we drive AI, data, and cloud adoption forward, we are simultaneously advancing AI security frameworks, post-quantum resilience, and compliance-first architectures. Our investments through Help AG are designed to protect the entire innovation lifecycle — from data and infrastructure to users and algorithms.

Our dedication to regional and global digital economies is unwavering. We actively contribute to economic diversification by empowering businesses with digital tools essential for innovation and market penetration. Our initiatives in cloud adoption, for instance, provide companies with the flexibility to scale operations and adapt swiftly to changing market demands. Additionally, our focus on IoT applications revolutionizes efficiency in sectors like utilities, manufacturing, and transportation, paving the way for smarter, more sustainable operations.

e& enterprise is built for scale and designed for speed. Through relentless innovation, operational flexibility, and a commitment to nurturing digital economies, we are enabling and empowering businesses, governments, and communities to unlock their digital potential and lead with confidence.
 

3.  Regarding strategic international expansion, which expansions do you intend to undertake?

Our international expansion is driven by purpose — identifying digitally emergent markets where we can lead with differentiated value, shape transformation, and localize impact. In the GCC, we’ve deepened our footprint in Saudi Arabia and Qatar through Help AG and Bespin Global, supporting sovereign cloud, cybersecurity, and smart city initiatives aligned with Vision 2030 and other national mandates. In parallel, our hyperscaler partnerships with AWS and Microsoft continue to power mission-critical transformation across the region.

In North Africa, we’re expanding cybersecurity capabilities into Egypt, a market that’s increasingly important both as an enterprise hub and as a source of high-quality digital talent. Our cybersecurity brand Help AG and new delivery capabilities in Egypt reflect our long-term confidence in the region’s role in supporting scalable operations.

Turkey has become a strategic entry point into Eastern Europe through our investment in GlassHouse, a cloud and managed services provider with strong local presence. Similarly, leveraging e& recent movement into Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) through PPF Group will open new doors in fintech and government transformation.

Further south, we’ve entered the South African market via Haifin, extending our fintech reach, and are also engaging Oman through Beehive to broaden our financial services capabilities.

Each of these markets is viewed as a strategic node — allowing us to deploy specialized capabilities while scaling shared platforms such as cloud, cybersecurity, and AI innovation. To draw a parallel, think of our expansion strategy like launching satellites into orbit — each market is a satellite equipped with specific capabilities and objectives, but all are part of a synchronized constellation. Together, they extend our reach, visibility, and impact. In every market, it’s not just about presence — it’s about relevance. Our expansion is purpose-led, context-aware, and built to deliver scalable, sustainable value.
 

4.  Discuss e& enterprise’s expansion in Egypt and Turkey, and how do these steps align with the broader growth strategy for e& enterprise?

Our entry into Egypt and Turkey reflects a broader ambition to establish strategic footholds in digitally emergent markets where we see sustained demand for transformation, scalable opportunity, and long-term relevance.

In Egypt, we’ve expanded our cybersecurity footprint through Help AG, with a dual focus: supporting national-level digitization efforts and building a regional delivery hub. Egypt is not only investing in digital government, AI strategy, and public sector transformation — it’s also home to one of the region’s largest pools of tech talent. By establishing operations here, we’re ensuring we can deliver localized, secure solutions while also creating a scalable back end for the broader North African and GCC markets. This isn’t just expansion; it’s strategic anchoring.

Turkey, meanwhile, provides a natural gateway into Eastern Europe and Central Asia — markets with rising digital maturity but fragmented service ecosystems. Our acquisition of GlassHouse allows us to tap into Turkey’s vibrant midmarket and industrial base. The company’s deep capabilities in cloud and managed services provide a strong platform for sector-specific offerings in manufacturing, finance, and logistics. In parallel, we are actively exploring cybersecurity expansion in these markets to complement our cloud-first capabilities. By integrating GlassHouse into our operating model, we’re expanding not just in geography, but in domain relevance.

These two expansions are integral to our “multi-market depth strategy” — a deliberate shift from isolated market plays to interconnected regional ecosystems. Egypt and Turkey provide what I call “dual advantage”: they’re both demand centers (with ambitious national digital agendas) and delivery centers (with skilled labor and innovation capacity).

We view them as connected growth nodes — each adding resilience and relevance to our broader regional network. Through them, we’re shaping a more resilient, diversified, and future-ready e& enterprise — one that can respond to localized needs while delivering global-grade solution.
 

5. You have achieved strong acceleration in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. How can we discuss and highlight the success of the organic growth of the business sector in the Saudi market and the factors behind this growth?

Saudi Arabia has emerged as a standout success story for e& enterprise, driven by a perfect convergence of market readiness, sovereign ambition, and our localized innovation model.

In the past year alone, we saw 84% year-on-year growth in the Kingdom, with cybersecurity revenue surging 90%, reflecting both growing trust in our capabilities and the urgency among public and private sector entities to secure their digital infrastructure.

At the heart of this momentum, Help AG, our cybersecurity arm, has spearheaded key initiatives to bolster national resilience. We’ve established a local Security Operations Center (SOC) and Network Operations Center (NOC), serving as vital in-country command hubs for real-time threat detection, incident response, and infrastructure monitoring. These centers ensure regulatory compliance, data sovereignty, and rapid responsiveness — significantly reducing dependence on offshore support and enhancing client confidence. What also sets us apart is our commitment to innovation in cybersecurity — delivering advanced offerings around cloud security, data protection in AI environments, and compliance frameworks tailored to local regulations.

But our investments go far beyond infrastructure. We’ve made a long-term commitment to building national capability across all business lines. A standout achievement in this regard is the launch of our state-of-the-art Contact Center in 2024, which delivers world-class customer engagement while creating substantial local employment opportunities. With 400 operational seats and a rotational model that can support up to 1,200 Saudi nationals, this center directly contributes to national localization goals and workforce development under Vision 2030.

This growth was not the result of inorganic expansion. It was earned – through credibility, strategic partnerships, tailored offerings, and long-term investment in local talent and infrastructure. Rather than importing solutions, we built them from the ground up in alignment with the Kingdom’s unique needs and ambitions. It reflects the maturity of our pipeline and the success of our long-term engagements – not a temporary spike, but a meaningful shift.

Our Saudi growth is more than a metric; it’s a model of what happens when strategic alignment meets deep operational execution. It reinforces our belief in being locally present and regionally dominant — and it sets a benchmark as we look to replicate this playbook across Egypt, Turkey, and Central & Eastern Europe.

6.  What is the role of enhanced capabilities of businesses through cloud computing services, cybersecurity, data, artificial intelligence, and digital transformation consulting, and their role in future innovation?

At e& enterprise, we see digital transformation not as a product suite, but as a capability accelerator. Cloud computing, cybersecurity, data intelligence, and AI are no longer optional add-ons — they are foundational pillars of modern business strategy and long-term competitiveness.

Cloud enables businesses to scale with speed and resilience, eliminating the constraints of legacy infrastructure. But we go a step further — through our partnerships with AWS and Microsoft, we’re helping enterprises move from cloud adoption to cloud-native innovation, where applications evolve in real time and customer experience is continuously optimized. This cloud infrastructure is foundational to the infrastructure of intelligence — a connected, agile ecosystem where data, compute, and AI are seamlessly integrated to power innovation at scale. It’s not just about faster systems — it’s about building a responsive digital core that senses, adapts, and evolves with the needs of the business and its customers.

Cybersecurity, particularly through our Help AG unit, ensures trust and operational continuity. Cybersecurity today commands boardroom attention — influencing not just risk management but the entire digital transformation agenda. As organizations digitize at scale, it becomes central to executive decision-making — embedded in strategy, governance, and innovation. We are advancing capabilities in AI security, API protection, post-quantum resilience, and regulatory compliance — securing the full spectrum of digital infrastructure. Our approach is secure by design — embedding protection, privacy, and trust into every layer of the digital journey, from architecture to application. Equally important, we focus on resilience — ensuring that businesses can anticipate, withstand, and recover from cyber disruptions with agility and confidence.

Our work in data intelligence and AI — notably the Generative AI Center of Excellence — transforms raw data into real-time intelligence. Whether it’s dynamic pricing, predictive maintenance, or personalized healthcare, we’re enabling decisions to be smarter, faster, and more human-centric. This intelligence becomes the strategic differentiator in a world where insight, not just information, defines success.

Digital transformation also brings with it an imperative for sustainability. We embed environmental responsibility into every layer — from optimizing energy use in cloud architectures to applying AI for smarter resource management. Whether it’s reducing carbon footprints through IoT-enabled operations or deploying green cloud solutions, we help clients align digital growth with environmental stewardship. Sustainability is not just a compliance issue — it’s a lever for innovation, operational efficiency, and long-term value creation.

To augment all of these, our strategic consulting layer ties all these capabilities together. We don’t just deliver tools; we orchestrate transformation — aligning strategy with technology and culture with execution – all with a forward-thinking, sustainable lens. Our approach ensures that every initiative not only delivers impact today but also builds a resilient foundation for tomorrow.

In essence, these capabilities turn our clients into innovation engines. They future-proof businesses while opening entirely new revenue models, service offerings, and customer experiences. The future belongs to those who build with purpose, intelligence, and resilience – and that’s the future we’re enabling.
 

7.  What about strategic partnerships for future growth, and how do we review these partnerships?

Strategic partnerships are the cornerstones of our scalability and specialization. We view every partnership as a force multiplier — allowing us to bring differentiated capabilities to market faster, with greater relevance and reduced friction. Think of our partnerships not as vendors, but as innovation allies, jointly shaping the future with us. We scale faster, go deeper, and win more sustainably through this ecosystem-first mindset.

To ensure we unlock enduring value from each relationship, we assess partnerships across four key dimensions:

1. Strategic Intent Alignment

We begin by asking: Is this a partner that shares our long-term ambition?
This goes beyond market or sector overlap. We look for alignment in purpose, timing, and growth philosophy — particularly in areas like AI adoption, sovereign cloud, fintech innovation, cybersecurity modernization or healthcare transformation. The ideal partner is one that enables us to co-shape market outcomes, not just react to them.

2. Capability Acceleration & Differentiation

Here, we assess how a partner enhances our competitive edge.
Do they offer unique intellectual property, deep tech, or vertical expertise that accelerates our roadmap — or brings a level of specialization we choose not to build internally? Partnerships must help us build faster, scale smarter, or differentiate deeper.

3. Ecosystem Integration & Network Effect

A strong partner isn’t just valuable to us — they must also create value for the ecosystem around us. We ask: can they integrate with our platforms, enhance our marketplace offerings, or create new customer value chains with us? The best partnerships unlock network effects, opening new customer segments, geographies, or co-sell opportunities.

4. Co-Innovation Potential & Cultural Compatibility

Finally, we evaluate the potential to co-create. Does the partner share a similar pace of innovation? Do we have mutual trust, governance structures, and the ability to iterate together? Cultural fit — both in mindset and delivery — determines whether the partnership will deliver 10x results or remain tactical.

In short, we don't partner for presence — we partner for progress. We’re highly deliberate in who we partner with — it’s not about volume, but value creation. Every partnership we enter must make us faster, smarter, and more future-ready. And just as importantly, it must enable our customers to thrive in a digital-first world.

8.  Who are they, how do they contribute to the future vision, and what impact do they have on market growth and customer base expansion?

We’ve curated a powerful network of high-impact partners — each one playing a role in delivering on our vision of end-to-end digital transformation across the region and beyond. We group our partnerships by their strategic contribution:

Digitising and Transforming Operations

● Huawei Cloud: Delivering sovereign, compliant cloud across UAE, KSA, Egypt, and Türkiye.

● Cloudera: Enabling hybrid data intelligence and enterprise-scale AI.

● Meta (WhatsApp for Business): Enhancing digital customer engagement across global platforms.

● Dubai Public Prosecution: Revolutionizing judicial efficiency with remote litigation systems.

● Egyptian Credit Bureau: Redefining financial scoring using advanced AI capabilities.
 

Driving AI-First Innovation in Health & Government

● RAIN Technology: Pioneering voice-enabled surgical assistance with ORVA — a world first.

● Burjeel Holdings: Scaling telemedicine and integrated health tech across MENA.

● Smart Salem: Powering AI-driven diagnostics with the region’s first cloud-based PACS platform.
 

Reimagining Finance, Payments & Sustainability

● PayPal: Enabling seamless global payments and e-commerce connectivity.

● Fils: Introducing carbon-neutral digital payments in line with COP28 goals.

● Beehive & Goldman Sachs: Unlocking AED 500M in SME lending via a first-of-its-kind fintech facility.
 

Scaling Regional Reach through Local Leaders

● GlassHouse (Turkey): Strengthening our data and cloud presence in a strategic growth market.

● PPF Group (Central & Eastern Europe): Facilitating expansion into new frontier markets.
 

Cybersecurity & Digital Resilience

● AWS & Microsoft: Strategic collaboration on secure cloud transformation and hyperscaler-native security integration — across MDR, identity, and threat management.

● Palo Alto Networks: Collaborating on precision AI-driven threat detection, SASE architecture and SOC automation to deliver proactive, high-fidelity cybersecurity outcomes.

● Fortinet: Joint development of secure edge and OT/IoT defense architectures aligned to national resilience frameworks.

● F5: Partnering on advanced application security and distributed cloud solutions, with API protection to empower AI security.

Each of these partnerships plays a critical role in our future — whether it's transforming infrastructure, enabling sovereign capabilities, or unlocking digital potential in healthcare, finance, and government.

They’re not just about market access. They’re about future readiness — enabling us, and our customers, to lead with intelligence, resilience and scale.

9.  It seems clear that the business sector, in the comprehensive digital transformation, supports infrastructure for cloud computing, cybersecurity, and the Internet of Things, with the strong entry of artificial intelligence. To what extent?

Absolutely—we view digital transformation as a continuum, not a collection of isolated technologies. At e& enterprise, we have purposefully built interconnected capabilities across cloud, cybersecurity, IoT, and AI, because these domains together unlock true business value. Much like building a smart city requires roads, energy, and intelligence systems to function in harmony, we see digital transformation as an orchestrated ecosystem—and AI is now rapidly becoming the intelligence layer that binds it all together.

In 2024, we solidified our leadership in AI and Data by launching a dedicated Data & AI practice—a full-stack capability that delivers real-world, measurable outcomes across industries. This practice focuses on transforming data into actionable insights and optimizing processes—from operations to customer experience—enabling clients to make smarter decisions at speed and scale.

We’ve institutionalized this further through our Generative AI Centre of Excellence, built in collaboration with global leaders like Google, AWS, and Microsoft. This CoE brings GenAI into the heart of business operations, driving efficiency through process automation, hyper-personalized services, and decision intelligence.

Our innovation also extends to sector-specific solutions. A great example is the Utilities CoPilot—a generative AI solution that transforms utility operations using real-time smart grid data. It enhances transparency, automates reporting, and provides proactive customer support, reducing issue resolution time while improving satisfaction.

We’ve also seen tangible business impact from AI-powered churn prediction, predictive IoT maintenance, and AI-driven sales forecasting—reducing customer attrition, cutting operational costs, and improving demand planning.

Cybersecurity is embedded into every part of this digital architecture — from securing cloud environments to AI model governance and post-quantum readiness. Help AG ensures that every layer — from data and APIs to algorithms and endpoints — is protected with industry-leading capabilities.

Looking ahead, our upcoming AI Centre of Excellence will embed AI across our broader portfolio—Cloud, IoT, and Cybersecurity—using a hub-and-spoke model that ensures intelligence is infused into every digital solution we offer.

In essence, e& enterprise is not just integrating AI—we’re industrializing it. We’re shaping a future where secure and scalable AI becomes a native capability across industries. This is how we deliver infrastructure, intelligence, and impact at scale.

10.  You play a significant role in localizing technology and developing the technical infrastructure. Is this reflected in your business?

Localizing technology is not just a strategic lever—it’s a responsibility. At e& enterprise, we believe that true digital sovereignty begins with local capability. Whether it’s through local data hosting, upskilling talent, or building secure digital infrastructure, we ensure that innovation is rooted in the needs and context of the region.

For example, our sovereign cloud initiatives offer UAE-based enterprises and government entities the assurance of data residency, regulatory compliance, and high performance—all managed by our local teams. This local-first mindset has allowed us to build trust with key sectors such as finance, healthcare, and public services.

Moreover, our AI models are being tailored to reflect local languages, behaviors, and ethics. In collaboration with local academia and tech partners, we’re developing Arabic language models and contextually relevant AI solutions—think of it as teaching machines to understand not just the language, but the culture. This is vital for sectors like public services, where citizen engagement needs to feel human and intuitive.

Our investment in technical infrastructure also reflects this commitment. We’ve expanded our edge data centers across the UAE, enabling low-latency solutions for AI, video analytics, and IoT. A great example is our smart surveillance offering for municipalities, which leverages edge AI for real-time anomaly detection—right where the data is generated.

And just as important is our role in developing local talent. Through e& enterprise’s digital academies and internship programs, we’re nurturing the next generation of cloud architects, data scientists, and cybersecurity analysts—ensuring the region doesn’t just consume digital tech but creates it.

So yes, localization is reflected not only in our operations but in our ethos. By investing in people alongside platforms, we’re building digital infrastructure with regional relevance, and by doing so, we’re laying the foundation for sustainable digital growth.

Read the full Arabic article on Entrepreneur Al Arabiya