In this powerful episode of Below the Fold, recorded live at the Dubai AI Festival, we sit down with Martell Gamble, CEO of Willbanah —a company on a mission to build AI that uplifts, includes, and empowers. Martell’s journey began far from tech boardrooms. Raised by a single mother, grounded in gospel music, and shaped by the legacy of civil rights leaders, he brings a rare depth to the conversation on innovation. For him, AI isn’t just about efficiency or disruption—it’s about justice, dignity, and community. He shares the story behind Mollify, his AI-powered nutrition platform designed to make healthy living accessible to everyone, not just those who can afford it. And he challenges the industry to reimagine innovation—not as a race for speed, but a return to human-centered technology.
🔍 What We Cover:
👤 About the Guest
Martell Gamble is the CEO and Co-Founder of Willbanah, a values-driven software and AI company blending technical innovation with deep social purpose. With a background in gospel music and civil rights activism, he’s on a mission to build tech that reflects who we are—and who we can become.
🤝 In Collaboration With:
Date With Tech Podcast | Launch.fndry | Trescon
📍 Recorded live at Dubai AI Festival 2025
[00:00:00] I don't like to do too much prep. Okay. I like to keep it casual. Fun. I got, I've got some poignant questions anyway. Um, but let's just keep it chill. Enjoy it. It's your session. Okay. Um, hi everybody. This is We good? Okay. Two, one. Hi everybody. This is Date With Tech here at the Dubai AI Festival. Um, in association with tracon below the Fold and Launch Foundry.
We are joined by the wonderful and very, very, very humble Martel Gamble. From, uh, Ana and, um, I'm so honored to have you here today. You are a headline sponsor here as well. You're a diamond sponsor. Absolutely. And, um, it's a real pleasure to have, uh, somebody of your caliber here to talk to us about what you are doing.
Um, 'cause you know how busy you guys get and it's just nice to get, pull you out of your, out of your, uh, you know, complex lives into more of a comfort zone, I'd like to say. Yeah. So that we can get to know who you are as a person and um, what you're trying to achieve in life. So welcome to the show. I'm glad to be here and I [00:01:00] brought my soul with me so you can learn who I am.
I love that. That's fantastic. What a lovely way to start. Um, so just tell us a little about, about who you are first before I go into the business side of things like Yeah. What's been your journey so far in life to get you to here today in front of us? Wow. So that is a, an excellent question and for me it just really started.
With very humble beginnings. So I grew up as a young male in the inner city, raised by my mother, and my story is a story of, I would say, set setbacks. Okay. Also, maybe some shortcomings and failures, but the narrative is learning from those, seeing everything with a perspective of, I never win I, I mean, I never lose.
Let me rephrase that. Sure. I always either. Learn or I win. So with my, my, my upbringing and being in a honestly single parent home, it [00:02:00] gave me a lot of opportunity to want to strive and to be the person that I needed as a role model. Hmm. And also to be a positive, just influence and to give back to my community.
So I, I grew up playing music, to be honest. I'm a drummer at the core, actually a gospel drummer. Fascinating and jazz drummer. So I was in elementary school playing very complicated jazz music. But I think through that it allowed me to have a connection with people through music and my brain development to learn science, art, culture.
And that's what it, even now, that's what a lot of my inspiration comes from, is still playing music, taking that creativity, bringing it back to software development. Bringing it back to our mission and vision for our company. How did you feel around, um, translating your love of music and that romantic [00:03:00] aspect of, of, of education and of, of your, of your soulful character and translating it into the business world?
Do you feel that there's a connect there or do you feel like you had to make a big leap to change a little bit about who you are as a person? There absolutely is a connection there. Okay, good. And it's, it's very good timing because. I just interview and I have a, uh, a book coming up called The Courage to Be My Authentic Self.
Okay. And on that book I have actual artists, so gospel artists, opera artists. And a big part of it was talking about what courage means. And it's basically a will, it's a choice to be brave in spite of fear, and through me music. It's been in my roots from growing up in my family origin was in the south and the US back when there was, you know, civil rights movements.
And my families were leaders of some of those musics. It started in the, in the, [00:04:00] the church. But I think that spirit of the soul and how you can take your inner being and allow your voice to reign true and to speak the truths that I was taught. Like now. And I think that's really at the core love, like loving people for who they are as individuals.
And then being that, that, that light still today. So it's it's hand in hand because at the core I believe that it's human chai or wisdom with technology together that creates or gives us more innovation. So. It really fits in with our name of our company. It's wana. It means the will to build software or AI solutions, and that that origin, it connects back to Hebrew, which means [00:05:00] bana means to, to build.
So we're, we're building with our soul and our heart, and we are helping to create AI solutions to make life better and improve the quality of life for everyone. Absolutely fascinating, incredible to see that you have such core tenets of belief and value systems that come from you and then resonate into your business and your practice.
It's so important. And sometimes we often forget that in the working world, you know, and a big debate that has been happening at the moment is around ai effectively distilling, or how can I put it? Um, breaking down that human touch a little bit. Do you think that's true? Do you think AI has the ability to either enable.
To do better work or do you have, do you think it has a negative ability to, uh, push humans out of the way? Yeah. I would say it's more the, the latter. Okay. Where it has an ability to enable, and part of it, for me, it's, I have a, an [00:06:00] academic side to me, but I also have like a kind of street hustler entrepreneurship side as well.
Mm-hmm. Where I see. What AI does, it levels the playing field because you can take someone that's a novice at anything and equip them with ai and that bell curve from between novelty to expert, you can get closer to the expert side a lot faster. So it may not necessarily change someone that's already an expert, but it can bring someone up, help level someone up by using artificial intelligence.
To help them refine their voice. You can create basically a persona of yourself, your voice, your thoughts, and software development and creating music. And I've, and I, I'm dabbling with a little bit of both, but I, I believe that it's more of an en enablement where it can enhance the creativity and innovation [00:07:00] and truly create value.
And that's basically what a business model is, is how do you create value. And then how do you capture it or monetize it so it can, it can give you the edge in both ways. Create ideas to create new value. Mm. But also you can get support on how do you monetize it. We talk a lot about, in our podcast, around the concept of the painter in the sense that the artistic.
Greatness comes from inside, which we kind of define it. Um, and the artist knows when to say no. Uh, when to say, stop as in like, this painting is done. That's where the value comes from. Is that human emphasis, does AI know when to say stop? Or do you think that the human being still has to play a fundamental role as the teacher in the development of what AI will look like?
It's, it's interesting that you asked that question because. It really takes me back to some of my roots in the Toyota production system. Okay. Which is founded in the Japanese culture. Yep. And [00:08:00] one of the key principles there, it's a concept called Judoka, and it means basically that a machine has two functions and it's one to stop on the cycle is complete or stop when there's a defect.
So I'm saying that to say that some of that goes into. My thinking way in regards to technology where with AI we can can train it, we can personalize it to know like when to stop or we can define what's complete looks like. So I think that that for me, I do like that when I do engage with different AI tools and chats it, it does ask me like, do you want more or is this enough?
And often I think it does extend my creativity more than it hampers it. That's really fascinating viewpoint. I think, um, I think you've really hit the nail on the head in terms of how I'm gonna now approach [00:09:00] responding to that question, because my belief is very clear in the sense that it's another paintbrush, it's another tool in the toolbox mm-hmm.
To help you be even better, to better yourself. And I love what you said before about leveling the playing field. And I think that's really, really, really where it's gonna be about and where people are gonna focus on in the next couple of years, especially in the educational space. As a founder, you're a founder of a big business now.
Um, before I go into, uh, what you do, 'cause I really want our listeners to, to understand a bit more because I have a few questions, if that's okay. Yeah. How do you say focus on real impact then? You're such a true person. You're true to your, your soul, you're true to your beliefs in terms of. Keeping yourself real, but also having to be a businessman and grow your, grow your business and deliver impact in that way.
This is a real conversation that actually our founder job, Abraham, and I'm also a co-founder, what we just had today, and it's like, I'll take you like in two aspects. So one is like the artist aspect, and then [00:10:00] the other is as far as when you say like keeping it real. Mm. And finding that balance. So. As a, as an artist.
I'll start with that side first, please. Like, my father-in-law is professional musician and one of the top producers in the world. Oh, wow. For, with likes of, you know, Mariah Carey, Lauryn Hill. Wow. Tana, you name it. So in that part of the arena, perfectionism, you know, it's, Hey, you, you continue to play until you can publish or record, and it's perfect.
I think that part of that pursuit and that discipline is needed as like a, like muscle memory in order to be great at anything. But I think on the, on the flip side of that, on the artistic, in reaching kind of the, the highest levels of greatness in whatever sports medicine or business, [00:11:00] you can look at the people side of it.
And what makes us human is that we have feelings. And how in tune we are with those and our ability to struggle and share those stories. Where we struggle is what connects and that's what keeps us grounded to the mission. And one short story is like we created a platform grant for almost $2 million in the United States, and it was focusing on social impact of how we can use artificial intelligence to help improve.
Um, healthy eating mm-hmm. For a lower economic or socially disadvantaged mm-hmm. In individuals. Well, the agenda switched to what was being funded for grants, where that wasn't any longer like a core initiative for our country, for the government, for United States at the time. So we had to maybe pivot in a sense for their grant to focus more on the technology.
But our core values as a company has not changed. We still [00:12:00] value diversity and inclusion, and we still value supporting our underrepresented communities by giving back. And we invest heavily, like in our arts community, within our, our community, our culture too. Because often art and technology are used and, and co kind of like copilots, where you use technology to fund art, but then art also gives you the creativity to create.
So I think it's a balance between. If we're for profit and, and we can can give back and invest back into our community. It keeps us grounded, but it also keeps that cycle of going where we don't forget where we come from. I love the fact that you are still focusing on DEI, front and center. It's such an important aspect of any business.
We all know that. We all come from different places, vari backgrounds, and we wanna be represented. Do you feel ai, AI can be expensive for some? Yes. You talked before about leveling the playing field. And [00:13:00] do you think it does unfortunately not play in the hands of some this more disenfranchised areas of society?
Do you see that changing? Uh, and what are your thoughts just in general? Yeah, it's, it's interesting 'cause I had this discussion with one of my mentors as a former CEO of Toyota Financial Services. His name is Mike Gruff. We had a discussion in regards to our product nullify. It's an app to help people to eat healthier with AI generated meal plans, grocery delivery with one click.
And one of the discussions we had where he challenged my perspective, he's like, Hey, you know, we, we service boys and girls clubs. He's on the board for all around, for, for, for the United States. And most of the, the people that they serve can't afford the $10 membership. So how can they afford the $5? 99 per month.
So that really changed me, my perspective. So in, in response [00:14:00] to that, we created a free option too. Okay. So we have a free option where you can still use the app, maybe not as much, but maybe thinking of, okay, how can we make this free so that we can serve with our business to clients or business to customer aspect, but then look at the business to business model when creating other AI solutions for other companies.
Growing our own platform as a way to, to grow the business. Still mollify. Is it your pioneering product, your kind of top tier? It's our, it's our first product. Your first product. Yeah. So we are, we create our own products, but when we also create software solutions or AR solutions for other companies.
What kinds of conversations have you been having here in Dubai, in, in terms of like your mission and the, what you wanna do with WILA here in the, in the region. Yes. So the conversations we really have been having, particularly with our, our mission in, in the vision in this region, what I've been [00:15:00] getting a lot of positive feedback, surprisingly, is that people really invest in the soul and they invest behind the people and the mission behind the company.
So we've been well received. And we've been asked to consider coming back to partner with, you know, the government here in Dubai, as well as the sponsoring conference to help be in the planning for future conferences. So I, so I think the big part of how, how do we have a presence here? I think that has been the ask is, okay, can you have a physical presence, whether it's in office or resources, but have that here in the region and then from there.
The investments partnerships, they're, they're knocking on the door. Dubai is a, and the UAE is a very hospitable place. Um, and I'm really glad that you've noticed that from the people here. Yeah. Um, is MFI available here yet, or not yet? Not yet. [00:16:00] Okay. So what we've been doing is our, our business model is kind of hybrid in a sense where we have that human centric, where we have registered dieticians.
Mm-hmm. And they're basically. Training our ai, giving us feedback on what features, and we refining that in the US and Canada. We covered that region. Through our partnership with Instacart, we're able to service for, fulfill the, the grocery delivery services. But we want to do that here. But we can take that learning, but we have to actually learn the, the region, the culture, the people here and replicate it with.
Partners here with the culture here, the different types of food, the diversity, the 92% expat, it's rich in so many different points of views Mm. That we have to consider and explore. Everybody's here and I think everybody's itching to get meal fify, um, on their apps and, and using your product because it's something that I definitely would want to use.
I think we have, we struggle as a family, not [00:17:00] only in terms of knowing what to eat. How to eat, how to procure food. We waste too much food. We don't like, we wanna be more sustainable. I think a lot of people in that boat and I'm really, really excited to see you guys come to the Middle East. Um, I'm so happy that you're here today.
I just have one last question for you. Yeah. Because we're running outta time. What is the future of technology for you? Like, oh, let me, let me rephrase. Finish this sentence. The future of tech is, for me, the future of techs tech is having. AI personalized agents or copilots for everyone and ultimately free.
So then that way the, the humble person that is, you know, a working mom like my mother, single parent growing up, she can have assistance with how can I cook healthy? How can I have a tutor for my kid? How do I help my kid apply to college? Like questions [00:18:00] that I didn't. Have the answers for or resources for.
But then on the flip side, for those that may have more resources, it's only another enabler where you can even expand the, the opportunity that you currently have. It's really beautiful and I really hope that dream comes true. Martel, thank you so much for joining us today on Date With Tech. You've been a really, really great interview.
You're a super nice guy. I can't wait to see how, how well you do across the world and uh, keep in touch with us and hope to have you back soon. Absolutely. And it was my pleasure to be here. Thank much you for having us. Thank you so much, my honor. That was brilliant. I loved it. You're such a great guy to talk to.
No, it felt natural. Good, good. That's really nice. Sorry, last one. Can you introduce yourself here? Looking at the camera and what do you want me to do? Yeah, just introduce yourself. Introduce yourself. Okay. Looking at the camera. Alright. And tell me when to go. One gamble. Hi, my name is Martel Gamble and I am the CEO of Wana.
It means. The will [00:19:00] to build software. Incredible. I love that. Thank you. Thank you. We'll do one pick.