FF News Tattoo Studio: Eastnets Building Embedded Compliance for Global Payments

Hazem Mulhim of Eastnets, spoke with FF News at the Tattoo Studio during Sibos 2025 about four decades of building, and repeatedly reinventing, a fintech focused on payments and compliance. The thread throughout: read shocks early, turn them into strategy, keep purpose front and center.

In 1984, after time in the US watching everyday shoppers buy PCs at places like Radio Shack, he launched Eastnets to replicate that access in the Middle East. He sold roughly 10,000 computers in five years, helping widen basic computer literacy, initially a pure hardware play.

The 1990 Gulf War cut off imports and broke supply chains, Mulhim pivoted from boxes to added-value services, a first major step toward software and managed offerings. A second inflection came in 2003 when Easnets became a SWIFT partner. As SWIFT moved from telephony lines to IP he built a service bureau so banks, especially in harder-to-reach markets, could connect securely without heavy in-house infrastructure.

Post-9/11, global AML and sanctions rules tightened and Mulhim expanded into RegTech, screening, transaction monitoring, watchlist filtering by acquiring a Belgian software firm, rounding Eastnets from connectivity into embedded compliance.

Asked why he’s still pushing when he could “sit on a beach,” Mulhim cites purpose: raising awareness, extending a hand, and helping others grow stronger. Downtime is fine, but he gets restless fast.

Operating from the Middle East meant living with geopolitics, wars, and financial crises. Mulhim’s response was survivalist and practical: diversify when capital thins, move when borders close, and keep adapting the model. A formative lesson underpins his book Two Brown Envelopes: after failing A-levels in 1970s England, his father withdrew university savings and handed him an almost empty envelope.