Investor Updates: March 31 2022 - Egypt’s Khazna raises $38m Series A round

Egypt’s Khazna raises $38m Series A round

Highlights

• Egypt-based fintech Khazna has raised a Series A round of $38 million in equity and debt, with the equity investment led by Quona Capital while the debt financing was provided by Lendable.
• Launched in 2020 by Omar Saleh, Ahmed Wagueeh, Fatimah El Shenawy, and Omar Salah, Khazna aims to serve underbanked Egyptians who have little access to formal financial services, including general-purpose credit, buy now pay later (BNPL), and bill payment.
• Khazna has raised a total of $47 million since the company’s inception. The new round will allow it to ramp up its efforts to replace informal cash-driven alternatives across Egypt.

Source: Wamda

Our Takeaway

Digital banks have enormous potential in Egypt, a country where 2 of every 3 individuals are partly or totally excluded from formal financial services but 50% of its 100 million people actively use smartphones. In addition to high mobile and internet penetration, the North African country boasts a young and tech-savvy population with 61% below 30. Startups like Khazna have thus moved to capture this opportunity with neo banking platforms, contributing to the general booming fintech sector in Egypt.

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Kenyan social commerce platform Tushop raises $3m

Highlights

• Tushop, a Kenyan social-commerce platform that enables communities in Nairobi to buy groceries more cheaply with free delivery, has secured $3 million in pre-seed funding round, led by 4DX Ventures.
• Founded in 2021 by Cathy Chepkemboi, Tushop’s mission is to make access to groceries more affordable and more convenient for Kenyans and eventually all Africans.
• The funds will be deployed to grow Tushop’s team, invest in tech to make its platform as easy to use as possible, and to further expand across Nairobi before rolling the service out to other cities in Kenya. 

Source: TechCrunch

Our Takeaway

While the idea of community group-buying is still nascent, the market has enormous potential. Africans spend $260 billion yearly on food and in Kenya, an average of 46% of individual income is spent on food. Tushop’s model saves consumers up to 60% on groceries compared to buying in supermarkets and other retail outlets while providing the added convenience of free delivery.

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ON Market closes $215k pre-seed to tap Egypt’s grocery market

Highlights

• Egypt-based e-grocery marketplace ON Market has raised a $215,000 pre-seed funding round from regional angel investors led by Yasser AlGhamdi.
• Founded in June 2020 by Moatasem Marzouk, Seif Yasser, Ahmed Najjar, and Moataz Marzouk, the ON Market app connects customers with grocery retailers, enabling them to order from multiple retailers in a single order.
• The funding will support ON Market in its expansion efforts across Egypt, in addition to scaling its tech solutions. 

Source: Business Insider Africa

Our Takeaway

As large as it is, the $200 billion grocery market in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region is promising and holds so many untapped opportunities. In Egypt, the market is valued at around $35 billion and is expected to grow from 15% to 20% by 2025. As such, investors are increasingly backing grocery-focused e-commerce players like ON Market with the market attracting more than $150 million in investments last year.