The journey of life is like hike up a hill. You go through ups and downs, but sometimes the moments that feel the most difficult and painful can lead to your life’s purpose. This is what Aya Baker, founder of Taa Marboutaa, experienced. Taa Marboutaa is a media platform based in UAE that she founded in 2025 with the purpose of creating Arabic content related to taboo topics concerning women and children.
Inspiration Behind the Platform
Aya is a legal consultant, born and raised in the UAE. When it came to her motherhood journey, she went through great hardships. She had her first son, Youssef, but then over 9 years, she gave birth and lost three other children at very young ages. Adam was 21 days old; May was 6 months old, and Laura was only 2 days old.
After conducting genetic testing, she found out that her children are special needs kids with rare genetic diseases, despite her and her husband not having any genetic disorders in their families. This led to her meeting a lot of women with children with disabilities. At work, she had cases where the women didn’t know what steps to take in certain situations. There was a common factor between all of them. They were all looking for support and to feel seen.
“I didn’t find any content that we can relate to. The content I found was in America, Canada or Finland. They talked openly about grieving, adoption and harassment, but they didn’t have the same culture, environment or spiritual background. So that’s where the idea came from. Why don’t I start a platform that you can see yourself in?” she spoke about the source of inspiration.
Creating a Community
Taa Marboutaa was able to prove the sceptics wrong. Aya was able to achieve her purpose of connecting listeners and leaving a lasting imprint on their lives.
“With every topic we discuss, women encourage us and send us their stories that they want to share and talk about. There is an episode called: “My Father’s Daughter”. Nour Alshami talked about how her father’s death was a turning point in her life. Afterwards, someone asked us if they could communicate with Nour directly because her dad has cancer. Although they didn’t know each other, Nour was the closest person to her at the time of her father’s stay at the hospital, when he died and even now, they are friends,” recounted Aya.
Million Dollar Prize
Taa Marboutaa won the pitching competition at the 1 Billion Summit in January 2025 and received a 1 million dollar investment. Out of the 25 start-ups competing, hers was the only one led by a woman.
“When we entered the competition, I was sure that we will not pass from the first day. We went there to share the story and to say, hey, we’re here and this is what we’re doing. Who is in? Everybody was happy for me when we won, which I really appreciated. But I felt so heavy because I felt that there was a huge responsibility on me. I started the company with around 70,000 dirhams, which is about $20,000, and suddenly I had a million dollar budget. It was a bit stressful,” she explained.
Future Plans
As Taa Marboutaa continues to grow, Aya is focused on creating content that changes people’s lives. They are planning on releasing a new program in September that discusses legal content related to women in a fresh way.
“Whether we help 10 people or 10,000 people, I care about raising awareness and motivating people to take action that improves their lives the way the show Lam Shamseya did for me. Before watching it, I thought I had reached the level of maturity, where nothing could break me after overcoming the death of my children. But while watching it, I realized that I was harassed when I was young too and had forgotten. The show encouraged me to take the step to hire a sex therapist,” recalled Aya.
Taa Marboutaa is here to tell women that they aren’t alone. It is here to lend a helping hand through hardships and connect women with others, who have walked the same path before.