What It Really Takes to Launch a Fintech in Qatar

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Financial innovation in the GCC is often framed around payments, licenses, and launch timelines.

But the harder work happens long before a product goes live.

In this special Qatar Development Bank series of Couchonomics with Arjun, Arjun sits down in Doha with Mohammed Suleiman, Co-Founder and CEO of Karty, to unpack what it really takes to build a regulated fintech company from the ground up in Qatar.

Karty is not trying to out-bank banks or outscale telco wallets. Instead, it is being designed as a financial management layer that sits between spending and understanding money. A digital wallet built around insights, behaviour, and literacy rather than just transactions.

Mohammed explains why Qatar’s wallet landscape still leaves a gap for mass-affluent users, how Karty is approaching savings and financial awareness as a bundled experience, and why monetisation in fintech only works when usage comes first.

A grounded discussion on fintech realism, ecosystem maturity, and why building the right foundations matters more than rushing to market.

🎙️ In this episode:

• Why Qatar still needs independent digital wallets

• The gap between telco wallets and traditional banking

• Financial literacy as a bundled product, not a standalone feature

• How wallets monetise without pushing lending too early

• Multi-rail payments and the future of wallet infrastructure

• Round-ups, savings nudges, and behaviour-led product design

• Building fintech under evolving regulation in Qatar

• Talent, infrastructure, and the realities of building in-house

• AI in fintech, where it works and where it is overhyped

• Scaling through partnerships vs direct market expansion

• Why Karty sees itself as a layer after banking, not a replacement

👉 Watch the full conversation to understand how fintech is actually being built in Qatar, before the headlines, before the hype, and before launch.

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CHAPTERS

00:00 Qatar Development Bank series and context
02:00 Why Qatar needs another digital wallet
05:30 The gap between telco wallets and banks
09:00 Financial literacy as a product, not content
13:30 Monetisation, margins, and wallet realities
17:00 Multi-rail payments and infrastructure thinking
21:00 Regulation, licensing, and ecosystem support
25:00 Talent, tech, and building in-house in Qatar
29:00 AI in fintech and practical constraints
33:00 Expansion strategies and infrastructure plays
37:00 Launch readiness and what comes nex