Showtime: Money 20/20 Middle East puts fintech on its biggest stage yet
The supercharged gathering, created by Riyadh-based event organiser Tahaluf, aims to position Saudi Arabia as a global fintech hub
With groundbreaking collaborations and opportunities for multimillion-dollar deals, Saudi Arabia’s inaugural Money 20/20 Middle East event aims to solidify the kingdom’s status as the world’s premier gathering for anyone looking to stay ahead of the curve in the fast-moving fintech sector.
Leading lights from the world of fintech and digital innovation will converge in Riyadh from September 15 to 17 for the event, which promises to set the global benchmark for the way enterprises and governments shape the industry’s future. An estimated 45,000 attendees – a significant proportion from Hong Kong and mainland China, including the brightest minds from the financial services and fintech ecosystem – will come together to learn, discuss, make connections and do business.
Beyond the business deals, the event is a launch pad for Saudi Arabia’s ambition to become a global fintech hub. Money 20/20 is an important element in the Saudi government’s Vision 2030, a blueprint designed to develop a financial infrastructure that will support a fully digital financial ecosystem. This comprehensive plan is expected to generate billions of dollars in economic value and establish the kingdom as a financial centre to rival that of London, New York, Singapore and Hong Kong.
While a branded mega-event such as Money 20/20 Middle East is a clear illustration of that vision bearing fruit, the company organising it – Riyadh-based Tahaluf – is an example of how quickly development can advance with the right conditions and support.
Founded in 2022, with the benefit of strong partnerships and government support, the company has grown at an exponential rate, with annual revenues projected to exceed US$200 million in 2025, a year-on-year increase of about 35 per cent. Realising that growth forecast would place Tahaluf at the epicentre of a fast-growing region and, by revenue, among the top 20 global event organisers, according to Stax Consulting.
Tahaluf, which means “alliance” in Arabic, is a joint venture with Informa, one of the world’s largest live events companies, and the Events Investment Fund, chaired by Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman. Tahaluf also partners with the Saudi Federation for Cybersecurity, Programming and Drones, which provides access to a range of high-quality speakers and exhibitors.
Tahaluf has not only grown as a company, it has also created more opportunities for employees. It currently has a permanent staff of more than 300, recruited from around the world, as well as the more than 5,000 event and digital platform workers it contracts annually.
In just three years, the company has launched a diverse series of highly effective business-to-business (B2B) events and exhibitions in sectors ranging from real estate and cybersecurity to pharmaceuticals and technology. Tahaluf’s portfolio also includes the mega-event Leap, a global international technology conference in Riyadh, dedicated to emerging technologies and innovation. The world’s most attended tech event attracted more than 1,000 speakers, 1,500 exhibitors and over 200,000 attendees, including start-up founders, policymakers and scientists, to the 2025 edition.
Since its inception, Tahaluf-run events have attracted nearly 1 million visitors annually, including more than 100,000 international business visitors. Its events have enhanced trade flows and made a significant contribution to the diversification and modernisation of key sectors in the kingdom. Contracts worth close to 150 billion riyal (US$40 billion) were signed between the Saudi government and various enterprises at Tahaluf events, the organiser says.
According to Mike Champion, Tahaluf’s co-founder and CEO, the company is well positioned for the continued expansion of strategically important events in Saudi Arabia.
“I applied a fierce founder mentality, which was to hire brilliant members of staff and empower them to make their own decisions,” Champion says. “They have sizeable budgets, and can go to market. They may make mistakes, but they can pretty much deliver what they want. With the current business in the hands of trusted experts, I can concentrate on developing new business.”
Champion also highlights an early decision to reinvest profits, a fundamental strategy that has allowed the company to fuel growth and innovation.
Tahaluf rejected the old-fashioned, transactional trade show model where businesses display their products and services to potential buyers. Instead, Tahaluf events create a sense of “festivalisation” with real value-added attractions, AI-driven interactions, and more purposeful exchanges between exhibitors, visitors, speakers and the media.
“These are tech-enabled hybrid shows which improve the experience for everyone,” Champion says. “We provide actionable insights into who an exhibitor or visitor might want to meet, and invite speakers from top companies to talk about – and demonstrate – prototypes of tomorrow’s technology.
“For a show on the scale of Leap 2025, for example, with around 200,000 attendees, 50,000 of whom fly in from abroad, the entire city of Riyadh is engaged. The hotels are full; there are dinners, desert trips, and art exhibitions in galleries and museums. We create something that people really want to go to, not a ‘hostage’ event where they only attend out of obligation.”
Tahaluf’s highly successful festival-like formula will be coming to Hong Kong in July next year for the inaugural Leap East event, which promises to be an essential stop for anyone in the tech sector. With major delegations expected from mainland China and Saudi Arabia, evidence of the growing bilateral relationship between the two countries, the event will welcome a curated list of top industry leaders from early stage start-ups and venture capital funds to pioneers in biotech and alternative energy.
“When planning a showcase like this, first and foremost, we have to make sure it is in the right market and the correct city,” Champion says. “We do a great deal of testing, calling up people who work in the industry to understand what matters to them, who are the most important individuals, what the market dynamics are, what people want to know and what makes business happen.”
By anticipating industry trends, and aligning services with evolving interests, Tahaluf can organise an event that integrates the physical and the digital, enables deal-making, and offers a microcosm of the future through live laboratories and onstage presentations, as well as opportunities to meet superstars from within the sector and the worlds of sport and entertainment, for example.
“The amount of support we have had from Hong Kong and mainland Chinese participants coming to our events in Saudi Arabia is enormous,” Champion says. “So we thought, let’s turn it around and make Hong Kong the base for our first-ever venture abroad.”