Let’s Tell you about Sawari Ventures, the Egyptian VC Firm that Raised $63.8M for innovative MENA Startups

It was all good news earlier this week when Sawari Ventures announced that it had finalised a whooping $63.8 million funding round for its Sawari Ventures North Africa Fund I. The money is meant for innovative North African and Middle Eastern startups that provides services along the lines of education, healthcare, cleantech, fintech, and ICT in general.

A press statement by Sawara Ventures said the funding round received commitments from Ekuity, National Bank of Egypt, Banque Misr, Misr Insurance Group, Banque du Caire, and Suez Canal Bank. Prior to this time, CDC, Proparco and European Investment Bank were among investors who committed to the Sawara Ventures fund.

In total, Sawari Ventures has raised the sum of $121 million, according to Crunchbase. It has also invested in about 30 startups which are located mainly in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region. Examples include the likes Instabug, Si-Ware, and Swvl.

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Headquartered in Cairo Egypt, Sawari Ventures was founded in 2009 and driven by its vision to foster innovation and entrepreneurship across the MENA region. Ahmed El-Alfi, who is one of the company’s Co-founders and currently serves as its Chairman, explained the objective behind the Sawari Ventures fund thus:

“The Egypt based fund is a privately-held fund regulated by the Financial Regulatory Authority of Egypt (FRA), which allowed us to attract capital from top tier local financial institutions to co-invest with foreign capital from international development financial institutions, doubling our allocation to invest in Egyptian high growth companies to one billion Egyptian pounds. Our aim is to create exceptional returns through investing in knowledge driven companies, which have the potential of bringing transformational changes to the Egyptian economy.  The fund will support local companies with dedicated capital,  in addition to quality expertise from our seasoned and specialized team, and the value add of our investors,” the Chairman said.

Besides Ahmed El-Alfi, there are three other executives who currently sit on Sawari Ventures’ Board. Two of them are co-founders of the company and they are: Hany Al-Sonbaty and Wael Amin. The last Board member is Tamer Azer.

Sawari Ventures has between 11-50 employees, according to checks by Business Elites Africa. You can contact the company through their email address info@sawariventures.com or phone number +20235701802.