Initiative
Habibi Tech
A Muslim-led technologist community, NYC-anchored, building infrastructure for the next decade of AI.
What Habibi Tech Does
Habibi Tech is the Muslim-led technologist community that's welcoming for everyone. Founded in 2021 and NYC-anchored, it operates as an initiative of AI Sustainable Development Group, Inc. (a 501(c)(3) and NYS-registered charitable organization). Habibi Tech promotes professional excellence in technology in alignment with Islamic values, and serves as the convening home for Muslim founders, operators, builders, creators, investors, and policymakers shaping the future of AI.
The community operates across three layers: a year-round community and digital platform; an annual flagship convening (the Habibi Tech Summit); and a portfolio of programs — founder events, panel discussions, Demo Days, and socials — that keep the network active between summits.
The Flagship Convening
Habibi Tech Summit
The Habibi Tech Summit is the community's annual flagship convening and the largest gathering of Muslim technologists ever held. The inaugural summit took place on Saturday 30 August 2025 at Industry City on the Brooklyn waterfront. It convened approximately 1,000 people — fifty speakers programmed across four stages, more than twenty-five exhibitor booths, and thirty-six institutional and community partners — across twelve hours of programming in a single day.
It was built on a straightforward premise: that the people who will be governed by artificial intelligence should be in the room where its direction is argued, and that no such room existed for this community until one was built.
~1,000
attendees
50
speakers
4
stages
25+
exhibitor booths
36
partner organizations
12
hours in a single day
HTS 2025
Twelve hours, four stages, three rooms on record.
Fifty speakers were programmed across four stages. Three rooms of proceedings were recorded and have since been transcribed in full — 68,991 words in all — which is what allows the summary below to describe what was actually said rather than what was scheduled.
Main Stage
Founders, policy and lobbying. Riba-free home financing and halal real estate investment structures, contrasted against conventional interest-bearing mortgages. AI safety, Arabic-language large language models, and regional funding. A closing session on civic and political participation in New York.
Breakout Track
Law and technology, including an extended account of the exploited labour used to train commercial AI models in Kenya, Pakistan, Colombia and Venezuela. Marketing and content creation, and how brands surface inside AI search. Pitch to Payday, on raising investment and founder dilemmas. An exits panel. Policy and power: political influence, and wealth as leverage.
Second Room
Inside the Digital Shadows, an interactive, audience-led session on the dark web, alongside product demonstrations from participating founders.
Almost 1,000 people came through the doors of this building and are here. And we have the lawyers, we have the doctors, we have the organizers.
Who was in the room
Twenty-five or more exhibitor booths lined the floor, and thirty-six institutional and community partners lent their names and their networks to the convening. The audience was not a single profession. Founders and operators sat alongside scholars, physicians, attorneys, civil servants, investors, journalists and community organizers — which is the composition the programme was designed to produce, and the reason the arguments on stage were not the ones a purely technical audience would have had.
Saturday 26 September 2026 · Civic Hall, Union Square, NYC
Habibi Tech Summit 2026
The Summit returns to New York on Saturday 26 September 2026 at Civic Hall in Union Square, this time during the week of the United Nations General Assembly. That timing is the substance of the change rather than a detail of it. UN Week is when the side-event ecosystem convened by the Clinton Global Initiative, the Bloomberg Global Business Forum and others takes shape around the Assembly, and the Summit's presence in that week is a claim to a seat at a table where this community has not had one.
The 2026 thesis: the wall between tech and creative has fallen. The programming spans four pillars — AI, Business, Content, and Creative.
The Seven Stands
The centrepiece of the 2026 programme is the Seven Stands: a set of seven declarations on what ethical AI actually requires, drafted and ratified by the community rather than issued on its behalf.
The Brandathon, with Ethar Relief
Ethar Relief joins the 2026 Summit as official charity sponsor, and the vehicle for that partnership is the Brandathon: a creator-led programme in which recruited teams build through a structured build week and present at a live judged finale at the Summit. Prompts release to teams on 17 September 2026.
The programme includes a founder session, charity sponsor recognition across Brandathon and Summit branding, and a live fundraising session with funds routed to Ethar Relief.
The Habibi Tech App
The Habibi Tech mobile app, launching on iOS and Android, is the community's digital home. It includes member profiles and directory, real-time community forums organized by industry and theme, a founder launch pad for new products, summit ticketing, and integrated networking. Membership tiers range from free community access to paid membership (which includes summit access) and VIP.
Sponsorship & Partnership
Sponsor the Summit
Habibi Tech Summit sponsors gain direct introductions to founders, executives, foundation officers, and policy leaders; positioning alongside the institutions UN Week is built on; inclusion in the global media strategy; private executive dinners and curated relationships; and stage moments in front of the audiences that matter most.