News

GSMA M360 Connectivity Event Returns To Riyadh

Taking place 5-6 December at Fairmont Riyadh, the event will feature keynotes and forums with global and regional industry leaders, experts, and innovators.

Published

3 years ago

November 22, 2023

Nour Nasir

GSMA

GSMA is returning to Saudi Arabia with its M360 event. Along with host sponsor stc and Gold Sponsor Salam, the expo will offer the ideal platform to explore strategies and form collaborations in one of the world’s most dynamic and rapidly growing digital capitals.

Taking place 5-6 December at Fairmont Riyadh, the agenda will feature “global and regional industry leaders, innovators, and experts” in a series of forums and keynotes. Noteworthy names include Ahmed Alsohaily (Red Sea Global), Dr. Bocar A. Ba (SAMENA Telecommunications Council), Håkan Cervell (stc), Hatem Dowindar (e&), Sheikh Nasser Bin Hamad Bin Nasser Al Thani (Ooredoo), Dr. Maher Shira (Royal Commission for Riyadh City), and more.

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Attendees will hear discussions and presentations on key industry topics at the forefront of technological change, including network transformation, 5G, cybersecurity, AI, IoT, and edge computing.

For more information, please visit the GSMA website.

News

Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon

Foreign visitors will be the first users to benefit, but whether Syria’s own banks and cardholders follow is still an open question.

Published

2 weeks ago

August 27, 2026

Dana Saadeh

visa's return to syria starts with a test and a bank in lebanon

Visa is returning to Syria. Its first live international card transaction in the country was a test rather than a launch, and the milestone event ran through a Lebanese bank.

The acquirer (the bank on the merchant’s side of a card payment) was Fransabank Lebanon, with Paymera as the other named partner. Nadim Moujaes, who heads a Fransabank Group subsidiary, describes the test as both the culmination of “longstanding efforts to link Syria back to international payment networks” and “the first step in a larger path”.

Syrian President Ahmed Al-Sharaa makes the first electronic payment in Syria using a @Visa card at a store in Damascus, following the lifting of US sanctions on Syria. pic.twitter.com/lpAN7nQ6Fc

— Tech Magazine (@TechMGZN) August 27, 2026

“We are excited to have successfully tested live transactions today as we plan to enable international visitors to use their Visa cards while in Syria,” says Leila Serhan, Visa’s senior vice president and group country manager for the North Africa, Levant and Pakistan region. Although a significant first step, that plan doesn’t come with a hard date for when a visitor’s card will work normally.

Mohammed Safwat Raslan, governor of the Central Bank of Syria, says the test paves the way for international card acceptance in Syria and that maintaining strong compliance, risk management and operational controls will remain essential. Serhan likewise stresses that Visa has worked within applicable legal, regulatory and compliance requirements. For a test transaction, it seems there was a great deal of attention paid to the rules, with the entire operation being carefully managed.

Also Read: Lebanon’s 5G Era Begins With 150 Stations And A $1M Budget

The test is the latest step in a sequence that began in December 2025, when Visa announced a strategic roadmap to support Syria’s integration into the global digital economy. In February 2026 it hosted its first industry gathering of banks, ecosystem partners and policymakers in Damascus and, the same month, signed an agreement with Syria’s Ministry of Communications and Information Technology in San Francisco.

Michel Kattouah, Paymera’s CEO, called the test “the return of international card acceptance,” but while that’s positive news, there’s no word yet on when a Syrian bank will issue a Visa card to a Syrian customer.