Saudi Fintech Shifts Toward Infrastructure and Embedded Finance

Saudi Arabia’s fintech sector is shifting from basic digitisation to a focus on infrastructure, embedded finance and cross-border interoperability, industry leaders said at Money20/20 Middle East. Speakers highlighted the kingdom’s growing role as a regional hub driven by "strong access to capital, major infrastructure investment, and closer regional payment integration," with recent milestones — including more than SAR 30 billion in fintech investments and high-profile funding rounds — underlining the market’s maturation.

"The fintech conversation is evolving from digitization toward embedded finance, interoperability, resilient infrastructure, and increasingly invisible financial services," Scarlet said at the event, summing up the themes shaping conversations across panels and meetings.

Scarlet’s remarks came as attendees and exhibitors described a clear pivot: startups and incumbents are prioritising underlying rails, partnerships and API-led models that allow payments and financial services to be embedded into non-financial customer journeys. The momentum is reflected in several concrete developments highlighted during the conference week.

• Investment and valuations: Tabby reached a $6.5 billion valuation, signalling continued global investor interest in regional fintech champions.
• Notable funding rounds: Oumla closed a $2.4 million seed round aimed at strengthening its digital assets infrastructure; Abwab secured a SAR 15 million seed round to expand its lending and SME offerings.
• Scale and product traction: Abwab.ai reported processing more than SAR 1 billion in SME loans in under a year, an indicator of rapid adoption for embedded and digital lending products.
• Regional cooperation and payments integration: Saudi fintech investments have topped SAR 30 billion, and a cross-border payments agreement between the kingdom and Qatar was announced, emphasising efforts to make regional settlement and remittances smoother.
• Corporate and ecosystem initiatives: The launch of Resal Pay and a memorandum of understanding between Plug and Play and Zest Equity to support startups across KSA, the UAE and Egypt were announced during the event.

Attendance numbers underscored the event’s scale and the region’s investor interest — Riyadh welcomed over 38,500 attendees to Money20/20 Middle East, where entrepreneurs, banks, fintechs and global investors convened to explore partnerships. Organisers also secured a "powerhouse of founding partners" for the 2025 edition, signalling plans to build on this year’s momentum.

Speakers argued that the emphasis on infrastructure and embedded finance is not merely academic: building resilient payment rails, open APIs and interoperable systems reduces friction for consumers and businesses and creates new product distribution channels. For incumbents, the shift means rethinking product roadmaps to support third-party integration; for startups, it opens routes to scale through partnerships with retailers, platforms and financial institutions.

Looking ahead, market participants said they expect continued capital inflows and more cross-border technical integration to follow the partnerships announced at the event. If current trends persist, observers predict a wave of product innovation that makes financial services more "invisible" — embedded into everyday applications — while the region’s fintech ecosystem moves from point solutions to platform-level infrastructure that can support broader regional expansion.