Funding announcements in July for MENA
Aumet, a B2B e-commerce marketplace for healthcare providers and distributors, has successfully closed its seed round of $1.25m from Right Side Capital, TechStars, and Plugs and Play. The funds will go towards automating the ordering process between buyers (healthcare providers, distributors) along with the medical manufacturers, and building the e-commerce platform. As well as onboarding 10,000 medical manufacturers to use Aumet's platform, increase the SKU's to reach 50,000 SKUs, and onboard buyers from GCC countries.
Aumet aggregates bulk orders from healthcare providers to get discounted prices from manufacturers and deliver the goods door-to-door. They also automate assigning distributors to medical manufacturers.
Felix, a insurance e-commerce and automation platform for brokers, announced that it has closed an $800,000 seed round led by a strategic Saudi Arabian investor with participation from the Oman Technology Fund. This follows a $120,000 investment made by Techstars and GINCO Investments in 2018 and will help the company invest in product development and regional expansion to the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
This funding announcement coincides with the launch of the new Felix software platform for individual and family health insurance lines of business. Brokers can now automate all their medical insurance quoting activities and provide their clients with an online, self-service platform to research, configure and purchase their health insurance policy.
GrubTech has raised USD 2 million in seed funding from the region’s industry leaders and family offices to accelerate GrubTech's product roadmap and deliver to clients exceptional capabilities to maximize online revenues as they navigate the impact of COVID-19.
With the rise of on-demand food delivery apps, cloud kitchens, and brick-&-mortar restaurants investing in digital transformation, Grubtech’s data-driven approach is focused on providing the sector with a suite of end-to-end future-proof solutions and streamlining operations for restaurants, cloud kitchens and virtual brands so that they can continue to thrive in an ever-changing landscape.
Kuwait-based HOT Technologies, a digital fitness startup, has successfully closed a US$1.1m seed funding from strategic regional angel investors at an undisclosed valuation. The startup will use the funds to further develop its product offerings to provide people an addictive take on fitness by leveraging the latest technology and by onboarding top coaches across the Middle East.
HOT Technologies is a subscription-based fitness application that makes fitness accessible and rewarding by putting exceptional workouts in your hands so that you can train anytime and anywhere. It includes thousands of hours of curated and localized fitness content.
KRISPR, an urban indoor vertical farming startup, has raised $600,000 in pre-seed funding. The funding round was led by KAIZEN FZCO, a family office based in Dubai, UAE. Proceeds will be deployed towards setting up the company’s urban indoor vertical farming pilot in Dubai Investment Park.
The pilot will commercially test baby greens, herbs, tomatoes, and strawberries in an aeroponic indoor controlled environment, growing high quality, beyond organic, fresh fruits and vegetables sustainably, without the use of pesticides and herbicides, initially for sale in Dubai.
Lean, a Riyadh-based financial technology platform, has closed a seed round of $3.5M from leading venture capital funds and sophisticated angel investors led by RAED Ventures with participation from Shorooq Partners, Outliers VC, Rocket Internet’s Global Founders Capital, and Global Ventures. The company also received investments from notable MENA and US-based angel investors including Samih Toukan and Jake Seid. The proceeds from the funding round will be used towards hiring the best talent globally to provide a secure, reliable, and consistent way to access data.
Lean is a B2B platform that builds developer-friendly APIs to provide FinTechs with access to customer financial data and payment initiation capabilities.
Mawaad Environmental Services has closed a $6.5M Series A funding after the company signed a 10-year operating agreement with Emirates Steel in Abu Dhabi and EZZ Steel in Egypt. The Dubai-based company, together with its subsidiaries in Abu Dhabi and Cairo, provides critical services for the global steel industry with a focus on slag processing and metal recovery.
The round was led by Ahmed Sadek El Sewedy, Muhammed Yesilhark and Youcef Oudjidane, and participation from several elite athletes in the U.K. including Kieran Gibbs, Henri Lansbury, Ross Barkley, and Jack Wilshere.
Mohtwize has closed its third investment round with US $250K in Pre-Series A funding from a group of angel investors including Hawsabah Tech Company, and Ithraa capital with their strategic partner in fund management, Squad Partners. This round aims to support Mohtwize to increase and diversify its Arabic Podcast Production, support podcast creators, and ensure the sustainability of Mohtwize as the biggest producer of podcasts in the Middle East.
Mohtwize offers podcast production at all levels for individuals, companies, and governmental entities.
Daman Investments leads the successful undisclosed seven figure dollar seed money investment in Spotii, an innovative digital payments platform focused on fashion, beauty and lifestyle brands that is already making waves across the GCC e-commerce landscape. The new funds will help support the growth of the business in UAE and its expansion into Saudi Arabia.
Spotii has developed a trusted and inclusive way for customers to “Shop Now and Pay Later” over four equal instalments with no interest, no cost and no catch. Additionally, business owners receive several tangible benefits, including full upfront payment for their sales, larger basket sizes, improved conversion rates and fewer refunds.
Ureed, one of the GCC largest freelance marketplaces connecting expert freelance talents with employers recently closed a 7-figure seed fund from Wamda, and Anova Investments. The funds will be used to fuel the company’s expansion across multiple markets and to continue attracting top talent in technology, growth, and business development.
They have also announced the planned acquisition of Nabbesh, a freelance marketplace that provides tech solutions for freelancers to work remotely or on-site with employers. The acquisition will help accelerate Ureed's expansion plans across new verticals and into new markets in the GCC and North Africa.
