Salesforce’s Mohammed Alkhotani on bringing AI to organisations across the Middle East
As AI shifts from experimentation to execution, Salesforce’s Middle East chief Mohammed Alkhotani details how the company is scaling rapidly, embedding digital labour, and targeting a new growth engine across enterprises and SMEs
19 May, 2026
TT
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When Mohammed Alkhotani last spoke to Gulf Business in June last year, the ambition was clear: grow Salesforce’s Middle East business threefold within four to five years. Less than a year later, that trajectory is not just intact — it is ahead of schedule, reflecting a broader shift across the Gulf where AI adoption is moving from ambition to execution.
“We were around 60 to 70 people in the region when we last spoke,” says Alkhotani, senior vice president and general manager for the Middle East at Salesforce.
“Today, we are close to 300.”
That near fourfold increase in headcount in under 12 months signals more than internal expansion. It reflects a structural shift across the region, where governments, corporates and SMEs are accelerating AI adoption at pace.
“Every country in the Middle East has its own strengths,” Alkhotani says. “The opportunity is everywhere.”
To understand that momentum, Alkhotani points to a defining regional advantage: the pace of government-led digital transformation. Across the GCC, public-sector digitisation has set a global benchmark, from near-instant passport renewals to fully digital licensing systems. That has reset expectations for the private sector.
“If I can renew my ID or passport in minutes, my expectations from any private-sector company are much higher,” he says.
The result is a widening gap between customer expectations and business capability, and a surge in demand for platforms that can close it. For Salesforce, that demand feeds directly into its positioning as a “system of experience”, integrating data, AI and CRM into a single operating layer for customer engagement.
Globally, the company reported $41.5bn in annual revenue, including approximately $800m in AI-related sales and more than 29,000 AI agreements. The Middle East is becoming an increasingly important contributor to that mix.
Locally, hiring has outpaced forecasts, while engineering and technical teams have more than tripled. This is a clear signal that demand is shifting from licences to implementation.
“The growth is faster than expected,” Alkhotani says. “But it’s also because we start with the business problem, not the technology.”
From AI hype to execution
Over the past 12 months, the AI conversation has changed fundamentally. Access is no longer the constraint. Execution is.
“Most companies have already invested in AI in some form,” Alkhotani says. “The challenge now is scalability, and how to make those investments deliver real value.”
Salesforce’s response is to embed AI directly into workflows, not layer it on top. Its flagship platform, Agentforce, is built around the concept of “digital labour” — AI agents that automate or augment core business processes.
“The key is embedding AI into the process,” he says. “If it sits outside, it’s a tool. If it’s inside, it becomes part of how the business operates.”
The impact is already measurable. Sales teams using AI are seeing higher productivity and improved conversion. In customer service, AI has moved from a lower-ranked priority to one of the top two areas of investment.
Internally, Salesforce is applying the same model. Employees are using AI embedded in collaboration tools to summarise conversations, generate responses and coordinate workflows. In one case, an engineering lead trained an AI system to understand his priorities, team structure and working style.
“It became like a personal assistant,” Alkhotani says. “Summarising discussions, suggesting actions, even helping coordinate meetings.” What was once theoretical is now operational — and increasingly expected.
The real bottleneck: data and access
Despite rapid adoption, a key constraint remains: data.
Salesforce’s latest UAE research highlights a clear disconnect. While 85 per cent of marketers trust AI to respond to customers, 78 per cent say they cannot access the data needed to do so effectively. That gap is becoming the defining challenge for AI deployment in the region.
“The biggest issue is not AI itself,” Alkhotani says. “It’s how data is managed and integrated.”
Fragmented systems, siloed customer information and weak data architecture are limiting the ability to deliver personalised experiences at scale. At the same time, expectations are rising. Around 86 per cent of marketers say AI is increasing customer expectations, while 73 per cent admit they are still running generic campaigns. The result is a widening execution gap — and growing urgency to fix it.
Without a unified data layer, even the most advanced AI tools struggle to deliver consistent outcomes. That challenge is also shaping where Salesforce sees its next phase of growth.
Opening up AI to every business
While Salesforce’s regional expansion has been driven largely by large enterprises, the next phase is focused on SMEs.
In April, the company rolled out Agentforce across its core suites in the GCC, at no additional cost and with no setup required. The move targets a critical segment. SMEs account for the majority of businesses in the region, contributing 63.5 per cent of non-oil GDP in the UAE and forming a central pillar of Saudi Arabia’s Vision 2030 strategy. Yet access to enterprise-grade AI has historically been limited by cost, complexity and integration challenges.
Salesforce is aiming to remove what it describes as the “AI tax” — the additional layers of cost and technical friction that have slowed adoption.
“The constraint is no longer belief in the technology,” Alkhotani says. “It’s access.”
Globally, 90 per cent of SMB leaders say AI improves efficiency, but 47 per cent say they feel overwhelmed by the pace of change and complexity of adoption. By embedding AI directly into existing workflows, without additional licensing or setup, Salesforce is betting that SMEs will drive the next wave of AI adoption in the region.
What comes next
The next 12 to 24 months will be defined less by experimentation and more by execution. AI is no longer a competitive advantage on its own. It is becoming baseline infrastructure. The differentiator will be how effectively companies integrate it into their operations, across data, workflows and customer experience.
For Salesforce, that means continuing to scale its regional footprint, deepen technical capabilities and expand access across the market.
“The performance will be better, faster, more accurate,” Alkhotani says. “Investing in digital labour is not optional anymore. It’s a necessity.”
In the Gulf, where governments have already reset expectations, that shift is happening faster than most markets. The question is no longer whether businesses adopt AI, but how quickly they can turn it into measurable advantage.
