Saudi Arabia

Qarar was a more advanced game. Same challenge as Switzerland. Take ownership of something outside the original scope. Ship it to production.

Before and during the role, I had been upskilling on my own time. Full Stack AI engineering. The foundations of large language models. Structured thinking with AI.

Every bit of that got tested here.

And it materialised.

I am leading the AI initiative at Qarar. Two pieces of product, both going to GCC banks.

First: a bespoke agentic quality assurance solution for credit-risk workflows.

Second: the deployment of a localised large language model for enterprise use inside the bank. This piece touches vendor selection, business requirements, regulation, hardware and licensing, fine-tuning strategy, and a phased rollout plan. The rollout plan went to the board of the Saudi Credit Bureau. They flew me to Riyadh to advise them directly. First time at board level.

Two things I learned in the first twelve months.

One. The technology is fundamentally the same whether you are building a weekend prototype or a production AI platform for a bank. The difference is the rigor. The edge cases. The maintenance. The structured thinking.

Two. Pricing is positioning. The same solution sold to the wrong buyer is worth five thousand. Sold to the right buyer it is worth six figures.

Find the right buyer.

Saudi Arabia taught me something Switzerland did not, and Sweden did not, and Singapore did not.

Generosity as a business posture. Relationships earned over time, not given on credentials or legitimacy. Nothing transactional. Trust builds slow, then holds.

Professionalism here is tied to cultural respect. It is not only about what you present. It is how you carry yourself. Respect is returned to those who offer it first.

That is the posture I carry now.