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UAE Lets Talented Coders Apply For 100,000 Golden Visas
If the initiative turns out to be successful, other forward-thinking countries could decide to attract talent using similar methods.
The UAE would like to become the region’s dominant tech hub, and that’s possible only if the country itself is home to successful tech businesses contributing to its digital economy. To achieve its goal, the country has just launched an ambitious initiative that lets talented coders from around the world apply for 100,000 golden visas.
Called the National Programme for Coders, the new initiative was launched by His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum in cooperation with Google, Microsoft, Amazon, Cisco, IBM, HPE, LinkedIn, Nvidia, and Facebook.
“The goal is to train and attract 100,000 programmers and create 1,000 major digital companies within five years,” said Sheikh Mohammed. “The National Programme for Programmers is a new step to build our digital economy,” he added.
To be eligible, applicants must be:
- Distinguished experts and talents who achieved success in various areas of coding.
- Those who work for pioneering international technological firms.
- Graduates of software engineering, computer sciences, hardware engineering, information technology, artificial intelligence, data science, big data, and electrical engineering.
The National Programme for Coders is available to both residents and non-residents of the UAE. All coders who meet the above-listed criteria can apply through The Office of Artificial Intelligence in the UAE government or the Federal Authority for Identity and Citizenship.
Also Read: Amazon Web Services Announces Plans To Open Data Center In UAE
It will certainly be interesting to see how many talented coders will be attracted by the opportunity to get one of thousands of UAE golden visas considering that we’re in the middle of not only a major global tech talent shortage, but also a pandemic.
If the initiative turns out to be successful, then other forward-thinking countries could decide to attract talent using similar methods, knowing that digital transformation is essential for shaping the future we seek for the next generations.
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.
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.
Visa’s Return To Syria Starts With A Test And A Bank In Lebanon
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