Adel K. Khalil

About

Over 20 years I have built and led engineering and product organizations at the center of MENA's most consequential technology companies, from Vezeeta's founding team through Delivery Hero's talabat expansion into q-commerce, to my current role as CTO at Almentor.

I have helped raise over $90M, led zero-downtime migrations of acquired platforms (Zomato, Carriage and Otlob), and most recently launched the first AI-powered skills platform in the Arabic-speaking world.

My work sits at the intersection of platform architecture, product strategy, and organization design, scaling teams from single digits to 400+ across multiple geographies, building engineering and product cultures that ship at scale without losing craft, and translating technology strategy into language that holds up in front of a board as well as an engineering all-hands.

Experience

• Almentor Jan 2023 – Present

  Chief Technology Officer

  Dubai, United Arab Emirates

  Arabic-first e-learning and skills platform serving 2+ million learners across MENA, with consumer, business, enterprise, and government offerings.

  • Rebuilt product and engineering teams from the ground up; redesigned platforms and experiences across the full portfolio.
  • Scaled the B2B SaaS offering and built a government platform powering national learning initiatives, including a Saudi Arabia workforce program covering 1,700+ job roles.
  • Launched the first AI tutor in the region; led AI strategy resulting in double-digit month-over-month growth.
  • Led technical readiness for the e& Egypt partnership, targeting 300,000 user activations.
  
• Dubai Chamber of Commerce Jul 2024 – Dec 2025

  Chairman of the Board — Software & AI Group

  Dubai, United Arab Emirates

  Led the Software Development & Artificial Intelligence industry group, connecting leaders, innovators, and policymakers to promote Dubai as a global hub for software and digital transformation.

  
• Talabat / Delivery Hero MENA Jan 2019 – Dec 2022

  VP of Engineering

  Dubai, United Arab Emirates

  Delivery Hero is the world's largest local delivery platform outside China, operating across 70+ countries. Talabat is its MENA flagship.

  • Founded the talabat q-commerce business in MENA — the highest-growing segment across all Delivery Hero entities globally.
  • Led zero-loss migration and integration of three high-profile acquisitions: Otlob.com, Carriage, and Zomato MENA — a global first.
  • Scaled engineering from ~45 to 400+ engineers across Dubai, Cairo, Poland, and Berlin.
  • Productized POS integrations, turning a cost center into a revenue-generating unit with a partners and monetization program.
  • Led migration of a 17-year-old legacy codebase to AWS using lift-and-shift and domain service extraction.
  • Founded the Site Reliability Engineering practice and Foundation tribe for talabat.
  

  
• Vezeeta.com 2012 – 2019 · 7 years

  CTO, Founding Team → Director of Engineering → Software Architect

  Cairo, Egypt / Dubai, UAE

  MENA's leading healthtech platform, pioneering automated physician and services booking across Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, Nigeria, and Kenya.

  Chief Technology Officer, Founding Team

  Jan 2017 – Jan 2019

  • Built product, engineering, and data teams from 0 to 60+ engineers; helped grow the company from 3 to ~400 employees and raise over $90M USD.
  • Launched a HIPAA-compliant EMR/EDR and Practice Management SaaS in 6 countries.
  • Launched the first doctor and services appointment booking platform in MENA.
  • Led technology due diligence with IFC, STV, and BECO Capital.

  Director of Engineering

  Feb 2015 – Jan 2017

  Software Architect

  Feb 2012 – Feb 2015
  

Expertise

Education

• Stanford University, Graduate School of Business
  Scaling Fast-Growth Companies in Global Markets
  2016 · Stanford, CA, United States
• Obour High Institute of Engineering and Technology
  Bachelor of Engineering, Computer and Control Systems
  2007 · Cairo, Egypt

Reading

• 01 Hit Refresh Satya Nadella
• 02 Designing Data-Intensive Applications Martin Kleppmann
• 03 An Elegant Puzzle: Systems of Engineering Management Will Larson
• 04 The Goal Eliyahu M. Goldratt
• 05 The Choice Eliyahu M. Goldratt
• 06 Radical Collaboration James W. Tamm & Ronald J. Luyet

Writing

• Essay Vertical Slicing: The Single Most Impactful Engineering Practice adelkhalil.com
• Essay APIs: Continuous Improvement Without Breaking Clients adelkhalil.com
• Essay Accelerating Experience for Newly Minted Managers talabat Tech · Medium

Press

• Profile Vezeeta's CTO Adel Khalil leaves to join Delivery Hero MENA as VP Engineering MENAbytes
• Funding almentor raises $10 million pre-series C round led by e& capital Wamda
• Speaking NAWI Summit 2026 — AI Empowerment Panel Yalla Nawi

Community & Speaking

• 2026 Keynote panelist at NAWI Summit, Kuwait — speaking on AI empowerment alongside H.H. Sheikha Intisar AlSabah
• 2025 Former Chairman, Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy — Software Development & Artificial Intelligence Group
• 2023 Speaker at STEP Conference, Dubai
• 2019 Speaker at Xpand Conference, Amman, Jordan
• 2017 Speaker at RiseUp Summit, Cairo & EngineerX Conference, Cairo
• 2015–19 Startup Selection Committee Member at Flat6 Labs and SeedStars (MENA)
• 2005 Co-founder of EgyptionGeeks — the largest technology community in the region with 100,000+ members
• Ongoing Board Advisor to a number of technology startups across MENA

Contact

Based in Dubai, UAE. Open to advisory engagements, board opportunities, and select speaking invitations.