The Architect | Mehdi Nadifi at Majid Al Futtaim | Lead Product Manager and Orchestrator | 2020 to 2021
From a 30+ feature deadlock to MENA’s first Arabic-dialect AI super app.
The joint venture had strong executive sponsorship, global talent, and an ambitious vision. More than a year after its announcement, it still lacked a single product the organization could build.
- 14 servicesintegrated
- 6 monthsto production testing
- 23+ peopleacross the delivery team
- Hundredsof internal beta testers
The story in 30 seconds
The pressure
More than 30 features, resistant business units, teams across four continents, and no unified product path.
The decisive move
Reposition IAMAI as a channel, reduce the scope to 14 services, and design the complete integration and operating layers.
The result
MENA’s first Arabic-dialect conversational AI super app reached production testing and internal beta in six months.
What was at stake
Majid Al Futtaim and I.AM+ announced the regional AI super app partnership at the World Economic Forum in January 2019. By April 2020, when Mehdi joined, the initiative was over a year old, the feature list had grown beyond 30 items, and the program faced cancellation.
Carrefour, VOX, SHARE, and other business units were concerned that IAMAI would compete with their apps and customer relationships. Engineering teams operated across Los Angeles, London, Singapore, and India. The product required alignment among the MAF CEO, will.i.am’s team, five business-unit leads, four external partners, and security and compliance teams.
Mehdi was responsible for the outcome without formal authority over these teams.
The mandate
Own the MAF-side product blueprint, define a viable MVP, rebuild business-unit relationships, and design every layer needed to turn the concept into a working product.
That included the account, wallet, loyalty, payment, partner, AI, administration, customer support, security, data governance, and reconciliation layers.
The decisive moves
Replaced the feature list with one product principle
Over 30 proposed features were consolidated into 14 integrated services. The MVP became a shared standard, making scope decisions consistent rather than political.
Turned a perceived competitor into a channel
Four months of stakeholder alignment and relationship building reframed IAMAI as a channel to MAF brands, not a competitor. Previously resistant business units became active contributors.
Validated demand before scaling the build
Customer interviews, focus groups, and market research provided leadership with an evidence-based investment case before the full build began in August 2020.
Designed Arabic trust into the product
The product used an OpenAI model with custom support for Khaleeji, Egyptian, and Levantine dialects. Grounding limited answers to verified product and service data. The engagement established the first LLM guardrails in the MAF ecosystem, including latency and cost service-level objectives.
Results
- Became MENA’s first Arabic-dialect conversational AI super app.
- Moved from concept to production testing in six months.
- Integrated 14 services through one account, wallet, loyalty system, and AI engine.
- Reached an internal beta with hundreds of MAF testers.
- Delivered real-time payment, refund, and partner reconciliation across the services.
- Created the full operating layer, including the administrative dashboard, partner platform, SOPs, security, data governance, and loyalty-extension framework.
- Demonstrated the viability of an Arabic-first conversational super-app architecture.
Partnership and leadership changes ended the initiative before public launch in summer 2021. By then, the product had moved from a stalled board-level concept to production testing and internal beta.
Engagement context: the product reached internal beta and was never launched publicly, so no adoption or revenue outcome is claimed. Program figures are reported by the delivery lead.
What they got back
One product that everyone could move forward with, eliminating the need to restart the strategy in every meeting.
Leadership regained a credible production path. Business units gained a channel instead of a competitor. Delivery teams gained a single governed product to build.
Why this matters to your organization
The hardest part of an ambitious AI product is often not the model. It is reducing competing visions to one product, aligning teams without direct reporting lines, and designing the operating layers that turn a prototype into a real system.
Press and public context
Official announcements and media coverage detail the Majid Al Futtaim and I.AM+ partnership, highlighting the Omega voice platform, its planned deployment in Carrefour and VOX Cinemas, and the group’s broader AI strategy.
These sources offer context for the initiative and its public launch, supporting the delivery experience outlined in this case study.
- Majid Al Futtaim announces its AI partnership with I.AM+ (opens in a new tab)
- Majid Al Futtaim and will.i.am’s I.AM+ outline their retail AI ambitions (opens in a new tab)
- Omega rollout announced for Carrefour and VOX Cinemas (opens in a new tab)
- Forbes Middle East covers the Majid Al Futtaim and I.AM+ partnership (opens in a new tab)
- The National examines the app rollout and Majid Al Futtaim’s wider AI investment (opens in a new tab)