Mona Itani is a social entrepreneur from Lebanon, a change agent and academic of a computer and communications engineering background. She is the founder and CEO of Riyada (Arabic for entrepreneurship) for Social Innovation SAL. It is an award-winning startup specialized in delivering innovative training programs on innovation and entrepreneurship for youth and corporations with a special focus on social innovation. Their mission is to foster the innovator mindset in the youth and in employees through well-designed hands-on coherent programs that embed technical, social, and entrepreneurial skills. Their programs equip the youth with creating technology solutions for the better of their communities thus enabling them to be change makers and leaders. To scale Riyada’s reach and impact, they are developing the first social innovation e-learning platform in the Arab world under the name of ShababLab.com.

For the idea behind ShababLab.com, Mona Itani was selected as one of 22 finalists of the MENA innovation challenge in 2020.