The 2024–2026 layoff wave: what is really happening in the software market, and what an Arab engineer should do tomorrow morning
Since 2023 the headlines look alike: a big company lays off thousands, then announces a multi-billion AI investment the same week. In Arab engineering groups the question is the same: “is our role over?”. This is an opin…
Since 2023 the headlines look alike: a big company lays off thousands, then announces a multi-billion AI investment the same week. In Arab engineering groups the question is the same: “is our role over?”. This is an opinion piece from someone who hires, lets go, and builds products in this market every day. Short answer: no — but the job changed shape, and whoever does not change with it will feel it is over.
What is actually happening (not the headlines)
- A pandemic-hiring correction: a large share of layoffs at global companies was a reset after over-hiring in 2020–2022, not a collapse in demand for software.
- Redistribution, not disappearance: roles that shrank: repetitive input, maintaining simple UIs, project management with no technical content. Roles that grew: whoever builds the whole product, understands the domain (finance, health, logistics), and operates AI rather than fearing it.
- The Gulf runs the other way: digital-transformation programmes in Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Qatar still import skills. Demand for people who know Nafath, Fatoora, Ejar and Arabic exceeds supply.
- Egypt as a talent factory: global and Gulf companies build teams here because quality is high and cost reasonable — provided the engineer can work with a remote client with no intermediary.
The rule that separated those who stayed from those who left
Nobody was laid off for knowing Laravel. People were laid off for knowing only Laravel.
The engineer who ships a feature from database to screen to deployment, understands why the client wants it, and uses AI agents to do in a day what used to take a week — that engineer is not dispensable; they are fought over.
What to do tomorrow morning
- Pick a domain: fintech, health, real estate, logistics. Learn its rules and regulations as much as its frameworks. “An engineer who understands KYC” is requested by name.
- Master one agent tool properly: Claude Code or Cursor. Not “I tried it” — you know when to delegate and when to drive, and how to review what it produces.
- Build something complete and ship it: a small product with real users is worth ten certificates in our interview.
- Learn to write: the problem, the decision, the alternatives — in Arabic and English. Distributed teams live on writing.
- Know the numbers: what did what you built cost? What did it save? Whoever cannot tie their work to a financial effect will be the first evaluated on cost alone.
What we do as a company
We do not hire by programming language but by the ability to finish a client’s problem. We give every engineer AI tools from day one and measure what they ship, not what they type. We invest in people who know domains: financial, governmental, health. And when we let someone go — it happens — the reason is that the role disappeared, not that the person failed, and we say so plainly.
Bottom line
The market is not expelling engineers; it is expelling an old definition of the engineer. Whoever redefines themselves as an owner of a product, a domain and smart tools will find the wave lifted them rather than drowned them.
