In the early days of the internet, the author was studying electrical engineering at Stanford, excited by the possibilities of the new technology. Later, working in the San Francisco office of the investment bank Alex. Brown & Sons, he gained an in-depth understanding of how to transform an idea into a corporation. Obsessed with the notion of starting a venture in his native Middle East, he moved to Dubai at age 23. There he saw that Arab youths were having a hard time finding work, while business owners were having a hard time finding workers—and he decided to start an online jobs marketplace to connect them. Fewer than 1% of people in the Arab world had internet access at that time, so clients had to be educated in the smallest details of the online universe. That meant installing the first web browser on many of their computers, training HR managers to dial into the internet, and printing and hand-delivering CVs.
Today, with tens of thousands of registered companies and more than 36 million job seekers, Bayt has expanded within the Middle East and beyond, offering solutions including applicant tracking systems, video evaluation programs, and virtual event fairs. And in most of the Middle East, the internet culture it helped establish is thriving.
