Visa has entered into a strategic collaboration with intella, an Arabic-first speech intelligence company, to enhance conversational AI capabilities for financial institutions across the Middle East and North Africa. Announced in Cairo on September 23, 2025, the partnership seeks to address the limitations of generic AI tools in understanding the linguistic diversity of the region. By combining Visa’s global payments expertise with intella’s deep-tech solutions, the initiative aims to deliver transformative customer experiences built around local needs.
Addressing the Intelligence Gap
Financial institutions in MENA face unique challenges due to the complexity of Arabic, which spans more than 25 dialects. Most AI systems struggle to process these variations, leaving banks dependent on partial, manually analyzed call samples that provide incomplete insights. Intella’s technology, purpose-built for Arabic, overcomes this issue by analyzing every customer interaction with unmatched accuracy, turning unstructured data into actionable intelligence.
Unlocking Customer Conversations
Through this partnership, Visa’s network of banks will gain access to intella’s full product suite, beginning with intellaCX. This solution converts call center data into strategic tools for compliance monitoring, agent performance, and product innovation. The collaboration also sets the stage for deploying Ziila, intella’s AI agent, to deliver next-generation, seamless conversational banking experiences.
Leadership Perspectives
Nour Taher, Co-Founder and CEO of intella, emphasized the significance of the partnership, highlighting its role in amplifying the authentic voice of customers across the Arab world. She noted that the collaboration validates intella’s core mission of placing Arabic at the center of AI design rather than treating it as an afterthought. According to Taher, the new approach will enable banks to shift from reactive service models to proactive, intelligence-driven strategies.
Basma Berti, Vice President for Visa Consulting & Analytics, expressed enthusiasm about the partnership’s regional impact. She explained that Visa Consulting & Analytics would co-develop tailored AI solutions, while Visa Implementation Services will lead their rollout across MENA. Berti stressed that this is not just about integrating new technology, but about building a comprehensive ecosystem capable of serving customers in their native dialects at scale.
A Shared Commitment to Innovation
The collaboration reflects a broader industry push to integrate artificial intelligence into financial services in a way that respects regional languages and cultures. By addressing dialectal nuances, Visa and intella aim to bridge communication gaps that have long hindered customer engagement in MENA. Their joint vision is to empower financial institutions with tools that not only streamline operations but also strengthen trust and accessibility for millions of Arabic-speaking customers.
About the Companies
Intella specializes in Arabic speech intelligence, building AI models designed specifically for enterprises in the region. Its products, including a dialectal ASR engine and conversational AI agent Ziila, enable businesses to analyze customer conversations with precision and deliver tailored experiences. Visa, listed on the NYSE as V, operates one of the world’s most extensive digital payments networks, connecting consumers, merchants, and financial institutions in over 200 countries and territories.
The Visa-intella partnership marks a pivotal step in the evolution of conversational AI for financial services in the Middle East and North Africa. By combining Visa’s global infrastructure with intella’s Arabic-first intelligence, the collaboration sets a new benchmark for customer engagement in the region. As the partnership unfolds, financial institutions stand to benefit from more accurate insights, improved service delivery, and stronger connections with their customers.