What I've been thinking about this month.

I've been following Mo Gawdat's work since his time at Google X. The way he talks about AI — not as a technology problem but as a humanity problem — always resonated with me. So when I found out he was in Dubai last week, I reached out. I didn't have an agenda. I didn't have a pitch. I just wanted to sit with him and talk.

We met at a quiet coffee shop in DIFC. No entourage. No cameras. Just two people who care deeply about what AI is doing to the region we love. The conversation lasted two hours.

What struck me most was his honesty about fear. Mo said something I won't forget: "Everyone in AI is afraid. The ones building it are afraid of what they're building. The ones not building it are afraid of being left behind. The only difference is who admits it."

That hit me because it's exactly what I see in the Gulf. I sit in rooms with CAIOs and CDOs who are under enormous pressure to "do AI" — but many of them are quietly terrified they're making the wrong bets. They won't say it on stage. They won't say it to their boards. But they say it to me over coffee.

Mo and I talked about why the Gulf is different. Not better or worse — different. The speed of decision-making here is unmatched. A ministry in Riyadh can greenlight an AI initiative in weeks that would take years in Brussels. That speed is a superpower, but it's also a risk. Moving fast without the right voices in the room means you move fast in the wrong direction.

That's why I built Minbar. Not to be another speaker bureau. To be the filter. The bridge between the world's best AI minds and the Gulf leaders who need them — not for a flashy keynote, but for the honest conversation that happens after the keynote. The one that actually changes strategy.

Mo agreed to something before we left. I can't share it yet. But it involves bringing his perspective to Gulf leaders in a way that's never been done before. More on that soon.

For now, I just wanted to share this: the most valuable meetings in my life have been the ones I walked into without a deck. Just curiosity and a genuine question. Try it this month. Reach out to someone you admire. Ask for coffee. See what happens.

— Ahmed