Dubai-it: 'Bring your ideas and build' – why this 26-year-old founder chose Dubai

Swiss founder Joanna Rubin cites Dubai’s speed and openness as key to building two startups within eight months of moving

Joanna Rubin, a 26-year-old Swiss entrepreneur and MBA student, moved to Dubai in January and within eight months has launched two AI-focused ventures and expanded an existing Zürich-based marketing and sales platform. Rubin said Dubai’s “pace” and willingness to implement ideas quickly have changed how fast she can turn concepts into businesses, and credited the city’s environment for enabling rapid progress on her recruitment platform and an affiliate programme connecting brands with businesses.

“Starting a business in other parts of the world can be a tough process. A lot of money is involved, and many people have a 9-to-5 mindset,” Rubin said. “There’s just a very good mix of people here, who are very open to ideas and have a lot of energy.”

Rubin, whose mother was a teacher and encouraged curiosity, launched her first business at age 20 — a marketing and sales platform she still operates out of Zürich. She later moved to Boston to begin an MBA at Hult International Business School, and then relocated to Dubai because Hult also operates a campus there. The move, she said, felt “natural” given Dubai’s reputation for speed and opportunity.

She described the operational difference she has experienced in Dubai as the ability to “make decisions and implement them right away,” contrasting it with other cities where “it can take ages before anything happens.” Rubin has prioritized AI in both new projects. “The recruitment platform was the one I started first, two months ago. Just yesterday, we had the first pitch, which went really well and we’ll hopefully find investors to grow the business,” she said.

Rubin points to Dubai’s recent Dubai-it initiative, launched in June by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, as emblematic of the city’s mentality. Sheikh Mohammed described ‘to Dubai-it’ as “to achieve something extraordinary with excellence in record time. It’s about turning big ideas into reality, just like Dubai’s incredible transformation from desert to global city in a short span.” Rubin said that mindset is especially visible in AI, where “the journey between hearing an idea and turning it into something tangible becomes dramatically shorter.”

Her day-to-day routine reflects the accelerated tempo: early mornings for focused thinking, classes from 9am through late afternoon at Hult, group work, gym time, and evenings spent at networking events. Rubin said the networking culture has been central to her ability to meet collaborators and investors and to test ideas quickly.

• Existing business: marketing and sales platform based in Zürich, started at age 20
• New ventures in Dubai: an AI-focused recruitment platform (first pitch held recently) and an affiliate programme linking brands and businesses
• Education: MBA at Hult International Business School (campuses in Boston and Dubai)

Looking ahead, Rubin plans to remain in the UAE after graduating from her MBA in two weeks. “I definitely want to stay and make more of the environment,” she said, adding that she also hopes to “explore more of the country – the different cities and the nature side of things.” For Rubin, Dubai’s openness — “Bring your ideas and help build” — and pragmatic execution have turned what once seemed risky in Europe into a practical route to launching startups and accelerating growth.