Young Arab Entrepreneurs Win Dubai-it Award for Ziina’s Transformative Financial Platform

Three siblings have built a payments revolution in Dubai, creating a financial platform that has processed $1.5 billion in transactions and now serves half a million users across the Emirates.

The vision began simply enough: make payments easier for businesses in the digital age. What Faisal, Sarah and Talal Toukan created from that ambition has become something altogether more significant. Named after their mother, Ziina emerged as a financial platform that has fundamentally reshaped how entrepreneurs and individuals move money, and it has now received recognition from Dubai’s highest leadership for embodying the city’s philosophy of turning ideas into impact.

H.H. Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Crown Prince of Dubai, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Defence, and Chairman of The Executive Council of Dubai, congratulated Ziina on winning the Dubai-it Award for Companies in the Field of Business. The award recognises the platform’s evolution from a peer-to-peer transfer application into an integrated financial ecosystem, and the remarkable speed with which it has grown.

What began as a solution for accepting payments by phone has expanded into something far more comprehensive. Today, Ziina allows individuals and businesses to send, receive, save and spend money through a single platform, all streamlined for the mobile experience. The company has introduced more than thirteen products and features since its launch, each designed with the fundamental principle that financial services should be simpler on a smartphone.

The numbers speak to the platform’s reach. Payment volume has surpassed $1.5 billion. The platform serves 500,000 users and supports more than 290,000 business owners, from small and medium enterprises to home-based entrepreneurs across the UAE. Within a single year, the number of active businesses on the platform grew by 163 per cent, reflecting both the quality of the solution and the appetite across the region for financial innovation.

H.H. Sheikh Hamdan highlighted the deeper significance of this achievement, noting that the award recognises not merely commercial success but the demonstration of Arab technological capability. He observed that Ziina’s journey reflects Dubai’s own development model: the speed of execution, the excellence in experience, and the exceptional growth that transforms an idea into real value for thousands of people.

Mohammad Abdullah Al Gergawi, Chairman of The Executive Office of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, emphasised that Ziina exemplifies how young Arabs can help build the new economy. He described the award as honouring not just a successful company but a demonstration of Dubai’s ability to nurture entrepreneurial ambition and turn it into tangible economic value. The Dubai-it Award itself, launched under the directives of H.H. Sheikh Hamdan, forms part of a broader commitment to recognising achievement across institutions and companies that embody Dubai’s philosophy of delivering exceptional results in record time.

The Dubai-it initiative, launched by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Ruler of Dubai, reflects a deeper institutional approach: embedding speed, mastery and impact into the culture of work across Dubai. It is a philosophy that turns vision into action, and Ziina stands as a contemporary expression of that transformation.

What it means for Abu Dhabi

The recognition of Ziina as a Dubai-based fintech success story carries significance across the broader UAE context. The platform’s growth demonstrates the capability of Emirati and Arab entrepreneurs to compete at the highest levels of financial technology, a sector traditionally dominated by companies in other regions. The $1.5 billion in payment volume processed through the platform represents genuine economic activity and financial inclusion for hundreds of thousands of individuals and business owners.

Beyond the immediate financial metrics, Ziina’s success illustrates the broader ecosystem that Dubai and the UAE have cultivated for innovation and entrepreneurship. As the region continues to diversify its economy and develop its knowledge-based sectors, achievements like this one signal that the conditions exist for young people to build ambitious enterprises from the ground up. The award itself reinforces the value placed on speed, excellence and impact as institutional principles across the Emirates.