Second Act: Tactful AI’s Mohamed El-Masry Reflects On Reacquiring His Startup

Building a high-growth tech startup is hard. Selling it to a leading international player is harder still. Reacquiring it once again? Almost unheard of.

But Mohamed El-Masry, co-founder and CEO of Egyptborn customer experience (CX) solutions startup Tactful AI, did just that in July this year when he regained ownership of his company, which, in 2022, had been acquired by Brussels-based cloud communications group Dstny. As El-Masry thus charts a new, independent course for Tactful AI, he tells Inc. Arabia, “Reacquiring your company is never just a legal process; it’s emotional. You’re reopening a chapter you thought was closed, but this time with more clarity and responsibility.”

From the outset, Tactful AI—which El-Masry co-founded along with Mohammed Hassan in 2016—was the first Egyptian-built artificial intelligence (AI) solution designed specifically for CX management. By enabling companies to manage every customer engagement in real time across digital channels, the company also boosts service team productivity through intelligent automation. “Tactful AI was founded to address a clear gap in the market,” El-Masry says. “Companies in our region are struggling with disjointed and outdated customer experience tools. We saw the need for a platform that would unify communication, automate intelligently, and provide teams with real-time insights, all without heavy development or integration work.”

In 2022, Tactful AI’s trajectory took a significant leap forward when it was acquired by Dstny. “That phase was incredibly valuable,” El-Masry says. “It helped us scale, fund our research and development, and access global talent, customers, and partners. It allowed us to mature our platform, elevate our standards, and validate its relevance across markets, from the Middle East to Europe and the UK.” But after spending two years under Dstny’s umbrella, El-Masry realized that to scale faster and serve customers more directly, Tactful AI needed to stand on its own again, and that prompted him and Hassan to reacquire the company.

“Our journey with Dstny gave us many advantages: investment, structure, and international reach,” El-Masry explains. “But over time, we saw that the next leap required speed, product autonomy, and direct connection with our customers and partners. Legally and operationally, [reacquiring Tactful AI] involved restructuring, negotiating intellectual property (IP) and asset terms, and reactivating the founder-led vision in a swift and clean manner. What made it smoother was the mutual respect between both parties, us and Dstny, and the shared interest in seeing Tactful AI thrive in its next phase.”

As the AI and CX sectors evolve at breakneck speed,Tactful AI is entering its journey’s new chapter with a distinct edge—combining its early-mover advantage with the lessons learned under Dstny. “Our time with the group made us stronger,” El-Masry says. “We built with structure, shipped at global standards, and gained perspective. Reacquisition brings us back into full alignment with our founding vision, faster, sharper, and more determined.”

And for El-Masry, this time, the opportunity today isn’t just about having the right product—it is also about being able to adapt it to specific markets. “We saw new opportunities emerge in strategic markets, including Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and the UK,” he says. “These markets need solutions that are not only powerful, but also flexible, localized, and aligned with real operational complexity. Reacquiring Tactful AI gave us the ability to go after these opportunities with a sharper focus and full control.”

Now, as El-Masry untethers his startup from Dstny, the entrepreneur admits that the journey has been both clarifying and deeply instructive. “I’ve learned that growth and focus must go hand in hand,” El-Masry says. “Ownership is not just about control; it’s about responsibility. And that partnerships, even successful ones, must evolve with the product’s mission.” Plus, returning to founder control meant rethinking priorities and aligning the product roadmap with what customers truly needed on the ground. “Vision is not something you rewrite; it’s something you reconnect with,” El-Masry says. “We returned to our original DNA: building fast, listening to customers closely, and solving real operational problems with practical AI and workflows.”

The reacquisition has also opened Tactful AI’s door to moving faster, listening closer, and delivering more tailored solutions for each market. “We restructured our product roadmap to reflect urgent needs: more automation, deeper nocode flexibility, improved accessibility, better analytics, and faster time to value,” El-Masry shares. “In Saudi Arabia, UAE, Egypt, and the UK, businesses are ready to adopt advanced AI, but they don’t want rigid, enterprise-only solutions. They want platforms that scale, adapt, and respect their operational uniqueness. That’s precisely what Tactful AI is designed to do.”

As for its long-term focus, El-Masry emphasized that Tactful AI wants to build solutions that are both enduring and regionally relevant. “We’re not chasing trends; we’re creating lasting value in sectors such as retail, e-commerce, public services, telecom, and finance,” he says. “The goal is for our clients in Cairo, Riyadh, Dubai, and London to rely on Tactful AI the same way they would on any global player, and to feel they’re getting more agility and relevance in return.”

El-Masry is thus aiming for Tactful AI to become a regional leader in CX AI, replacing legacy, limited, and complex solutions such as Intercom, Genesys, Zendesk, Freshdesk, etc., while also expanding its presence and partnerships in the UAE, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and the UK, and investing further in no-code innovation and advanced AI research. Ultimately, however, these efforts tie back to a bigger vision—as El-Masry put it: “Success means proving that globally competitive AI platforms can be built—and led— from the Arab region.”

Pictured in the lead image is Mohamed El-Masry, co-founder and CEO of Tactful AI. Courtesy of Tactful AI.

This article first appeared in the September 2025 issue of Inc. Arabia. To read the full issue online, click here.