Gamechangers: AI | Scarlt.AI’s Nancy El Khatib Is Using AI To Address The Personalization Gap In The MENA Fashion Industry
El Khatib was one of the innovators celebrated in the 2026 edition of Gamechangers: AI, an annual Inc. Arabia showcase of the business leaders driving the AI revolution in the MENA.
Scarlt.AI, the UAE-based fashiontech startup founded and led by Nancy El Khatib, utilizes artificial intelligence (AI) to address what the entrepreneur calls a major gap in the MENA fashion industry: personalization. According to El Khatib, while custom clothing is known to have cultural importance in the region, the process for it remains slow, fragmented, and offline.
“While women in the region expect instant digital experiences in banking, travel, and commerce, designing a custom dress still requires weeks of consultations, sketches, and uncertainty,” El Khatib says. “This is a significant market challenge. The MENA custom apparel market is valued at US$3.2 billion, and over 60 percent of online shoppers prefer personalized experiences. Additionally, 76 percent of brides globally report difficulty finding a dress that aligns with their vision; a pain point strongly reflected in bridal-heavy MENA markets. Scarlt.AI solves this by enabling women to design, visualize, and order made-to-measure dresses instantly using generative AI—bridging imagination directly to production, not just image generation.”
Keeping this premise in mind, El Khatib says that she’s not just applying AI to an existing model; she is reengineering an entire industry around it. “Scarlt.AI is not just solving a problem; it’s redefining how fashion is created, customized, and consumed,” she says. “In a region where couture and customization are culturally significant yet largely fragmented, I am building infrastructure that connects generative AI directly to commerce, empowering women to co-create, and enabling local creative industries to scale globally. Beyond technology, my mission is about identity and access. I am challenging the idea that high-end personalization must be exclusive, slow, or inaccessible. By merging fashion, AI, and e-commerce, I am positioning the MENA not just as a consumer of innovation, but as a creator of it.”
This approach also ties in with El Khatib’s broader view of how AI will reshape the fashion industry. “AI will transform fashion from trend prediction and mass production to intelligent, on-demand personalization,” she predicts. “In the MENA, where couture and customization are culturally significant, AI can digitize and modernize a traditionally offline industry, empowering regional designers and ateliers with scalable tools. What excites me most is the shift from passive shopping to creative participation: consumers will generate what represents them, not just choose from what exists. Economically, AI-driven fashion reduces waste, minimizes unsold inventory, enables localized production, and creates new tech-creative roles, positioning regions like the MENA to export digitally-powered fashion businesses globally."
Pictured in the lead image is Nancy El Khatib, founder and CEO of Scarlt.AI. Image courtesy Scarlt.AI
El Khatib was one of the innovators celebrated in the 2026 edition of Gamechangers: AI, an annual Inc. Arabia showcase of the business leaders driving the AI revolution in the MENA. Check out the full list by clicking here.
