Six startups advance in debut Mastercard Lighthouse UAE
Four-month UAE AI Office-backed mentorship targets global scale-up
#UAE #startups - The UAE Government’s Artificial Intelligence Office, working with the Mastercard Center for Advanced AI and Cyber Technology, has selected six AI startups to advance in the inaugural Mastercard Lighthouse UAE programme. Loyyal, NewForm Technologies, NodeShift, Polynome, Valura.Ai and zypl.ai were chosen from 14 finalists to join a four-month mentorship programme aimed at scaling their technology and connecting them with financial institutions and investors.
SO WHAT? - Mastercard Lighthouse is a global programme which has generated more than $1.3 billion in investment and produced several unicorns from its Nordic, Baltic and Turkish cohorts since 2018. Bringing that model to the UAE, backed directly by the government’s AI Office, gives these six startups a faster route to enterprise customers and investors. The Lighthouse also aligns closely with UAE goals of being a global hub for AI, helping to build UAE-based startups that can compete globally.
KEY POINTS:
Six startups have been selected from a shortlist of 14 finalists to advance in the inaugural Mastercard Lighthouse UAE programme, following evaluation against criteria including innovation, team capability, business model, scalability and global growth potential.
Mastercard and the UAE AI Office launched the new programme last year and opened it for applications in May 2026.
The six startups selected by Mastercard Lighthouse are:
Loyyal - an AI- and blockchain-powered loyalty platform.
NewForm Technologies - agentic AI for regulated financial institutions.
NodeShift - a sovereign Generative AI cloud platform.
Polynome - develops agentic AI for enterprises in Arabic and English.
Valura.AI - an AI-powered investment platform.
zypl.ai - AI-driven risk management for credit scoring & fraud detection.
The programme, launched in May 2026, is backed by ecosystem partners including Hub71, Global Ventures, Further Ventures, Shorooq, VentureSouq and the Dubai Future District Fund, and will conclude with a Demo Day for investors and industry representatives.
ZOOM OUT - Mastercard Lighthouse UAE opened in May 2026 in partnership with the UAE's Artificial Intelligence, targeting startups in agentic commerce, risk and resilience, and MSME (Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises) credit provision. MENA's AI market is home to around 3,000 companies and is forecast to grow at a compound annual rate of 44.8% between 2024 and 2030. Mastercard Lighthouse itself isn't new, having launched in the Nordic and Baltic region in 2018 before expanding to Türkiye. The global programme’s 228 alumni have collectively raised more than $1.3 billion and produced several unicorns. The UAE edition follows the same formula, pairing startups directly with banks and investors rather than simply funding them.
[Written and edited with the assistance of AI]
Source: MasterCard
Read more about UAE startup programmes:
Emirates NBD, Techstars launch AI FinTech accelerator (Middle East AI News)
Presight picks 12 startups for AI accelerator (Middle East AI News)
du launches $50 million venture fund (Middle East AI News)
MBRIF backs UAE GovTech AI startup with AED 1.5m (Middle East AI News)
Presight AI Accelerator triples applications for 2nd cohort (Middle East AI News)