Dubai-based production company MFORMEDIA has appointed entertainment executive Ziad Kebbi as Managing Director, as the company begins a major restructuring aimed at building an IP-first content business across scripted, non-scripted, digital and AI-enabled production.
Kebbi will oversee MFORMEDIA’s operations, expanded production slate and delivery across its content pillars. Managing Partners Khalil Homeissy and Ralph Matar will continue to lead group strategy and key relationships.
The appointment comes as MFORMEDIA marks its 10th year and seeks to reposition itself for a rapidly changing content industry, where artificial intelligence is altering production, platform economics are changing how content is funded and audiences are moving across formats and screens.
Rather than replacing its existing production business, the company said it plans to build on its established production capabilities while putting greater emphasis on owning original intellectual property. Its four areas of focus will span non-scripted entertainment, scripted content, digital media and AI-enabled production.
MFORMEDIA has spent the past decade producing and adapting formats, original ideas and content for broadcasters, platforms and streamers across the region and beyond. The company said its production network and delivery capabilities would remain at the centre of its next phase.
Ralph Matar, Managing Partner, said: “Khalil and I have built this company on a simple promise: deliver, every time, at the highest standard. That promise earned us the trust of the region’s most demanding clients, and that trust is our foundation. Bringing Ziad in is how we honor it. You protect what you have built by preparing it for what comes next, and there is no one better prepared for what comes next than Ziad.”
Khalil Homeissy, Managing Partner, said the appointment would strengthen the company’s ability to develop content across platforms and formats.
“This industry is moving faster than it ever has, and the companies that will lead it are the ones that combine deep production craft with real creative networks across the region and beyond. Ziad brings both. He has developed, sold, and delivered some of the biggest entertainment properties this market has seen. With him leading our operations and our slate, MFORMEDIA becomes something rare in this region: a company that can take an idea from first spark to screen, on any platform, at any scale.”
Kebbi brings more than 18 years of experience in the MENA entertainment industry. His previous senior roles include Managing Director of Endemol Middle East, President of Sony Pictures Television Arabia and CEO of Talpa Middle East.
His credits include nine seasons of The Voice Arabia, one of the region’s major international-format adaptations. His career has focused on bringing international entertainment formats to Arab audiences while developing original intellectual property for the region.
Kebbi said MFORMEDIA’s existing production infrastructure and regional relationships were central to his decision to join the company.
“What drew me to MFORMEDIA is what Khalil and Ralph have built: a real production company, with real delivery muscle and relationships earned over a decade. The region is living its most exciting chapter, and the next great wave of Arabic content will belong to those who can move across genres and platforms without compromising on craft. My focus is exactly that: building on this foundation to create, source and produce content across non-scripted, scripted, and digital, shaped by the tools and thinking of what is coming, not what has been. The best stories from this region have not been told yet. We intend to tell them.”
The move positions MFORMEDIA to compete not only as a production partner but increasingly as a creator and owner of original content, as the economics of the regional entertainment business continue to shift toward intellectual property, platforms and new production technologies.
