At Biban Global, Tech Revolt sat down with Afnan Sherbeeni, Co-Founder of Sabbar, who is working to reshape the hiring ecosystem in Saudi Arabia. As the Kingdom accelerates its Saudization and workforce localisation efforts, Sherbeeni argues that a critical gap remains—particularly for SMEs that make up the overwhelming majority of the country’s business landscape.

While many recruitment platforms tend to focus on senior and executive hiring, Sherbeeni says this approach overlooks “the 99%”—the essential workforce powering key sectors such as tourism, hospitality, manufacturing and construction. These industries, largely made up of small and medium enterprises, represent the backbone of the Saudi economy yet continue to face major challenges when sourcing and retaining talent.

Sabbar was launched to address this imbalance. Today, the platform provides companies with access to nearly one million job seekers, with around 60,000 new candidates registering every month. Sherbeeni describes the platform as the leading hiring solution for SMEs in Saudi Arabia, supported by AI-driven matching capabilities that allow businesses to find qualified candidates within 24 hours. The platform offers affordable plans for smaller companies while also serving large enterprises engaged in high-volume recruitment.

But high-volume hiring presents its own set of challenges. According to Sherbeeni, up to 65% of applicants in mass recruitment pipelines are unqualified, forcing recruiters to spend hundreds of hours screening candidates. Even among shortlisted applicants, nearly 70% fail to show up for interviews—an issue that is especially severe in high-turnover sectors.

To solve this, Sabbar introduced “Saud”, an AI recruitment agent designed to automate repetitive tasks and reduce the heavy administrative load placed on hiring teams. Saud reviews CVs, filters and shortlists candidates, and conducts initial screening interviews via WhatsApp. The AI agent then compiles the findings into structured recommendations for recruiters, who can focus their time on candidate engagement rather than manual filtering.

Saud also coordinates interview schedules, assists with document collection and even supports the job-offer process. Sherbeeni describes the tool as “the right hand of recruiters”, taking over the time-consuming aspects of mass recruitment while maintaining consistency and speed.

For Sherbeeni, technology is not replacing recruiters—it is enabling them. By automating the most repetitive parts of the hiring process, Sabbar aims to strengthen the overall candidate experience and help businesses achieve their localisation goals more effectively.

At a time when Saudi Arabia is pushing to build a more sustainable and skilled national workforce, Sabbar’s approach reflects the growing intersection between AI and human resources—and the increasingly vital role of SMEs in shaping the future of employment across the Kingdom.