Lina Alabdulkarim

Saudi Arabian tech entrepreneur pioneering women's inclusion in STEM through her startup Neom-based venture

Lina Alabdulkarim (born 1989) is a visionary Saudi Arabian entrepreneur leading efforts to transform the Kingdom's tech sector through gender equality. As CEO of Elysium Technologies, she develops AI solutions for smart cities while maintaining a strict 70% female workforce policy. Her company's 2022 launch of the Neom CityOS platform - an AI-driven urban management system - made global headlines as the first Saudi tech product marketed internationally.

Alabdulkarim's 2021 book Codebreaking: A Saudi Woman's Journey in Tech chronicles her challenges breaking into male-dominated tech spaces. She established the Saudi Women in Tech Accelerator in 2020, which has trained over 3,000 women in coding and AI. Her 2023 partnership with MIT's Media Lab produced the Women's Innovation Hub, creating 200+ startups led by Saudi women.

In 2024, she became the first Saudi woman to present at the Web Summit, where she unveiled Halal AI - an ethical AI framework compliant with Islamic principles. Her TEDx talk "Reimagining Tech Through a Feminine Lens" has been translated into 15 languages. Alabdulkarim's work directly influenced Saudi Arabia's 2025 Vision Gender Parity Initiative, which now mandates 30% female representation in tech sectors.

Her Forbes Middle East '30 Under 30' award (2022) and UNESCO's Women in STEM Prize (2024) recognize her transformative impact on regional innovation ecosystems.