Egypt’s Taager raises $6.4m to expand Middle East presence

The early stage funding round was led by 4DX Ventures, a pan-Africa focused venture capital firm and other investors

Egypt's e-commerce platform Taager secured $6.4 million in new funding to expand its operations across the Middle East. Courtesy Taager

Cairo-based e-commerce platform Taager secured $6.4 million in new funding to expand its operations across the Middle East as it looks to capitalise on growth of online shopping in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic.

The early-stage funding round was led by 4DX Ventures, a pan-Africa-focused venture capital company, Taager said in a statement on Thursday.

Raed Ventures, Beco Capital, Breyer Capital and a number of other private investors including Careem’s co-founder Magnus Olsson are also backing the company.

“In just over a year, we have built a huge body of data … and we want to enable many more social entrepreneurs and online merchants to grow their businesses throughout Egypt and the Mena region,” Mohamed Elhorishy, co-founder and chief executive at Taager, said.

The latest funding round brings Taager’s total investment to date to more than $7m since launching operations in 2019.

Taager is a social e–commerce marketplace that provides online sellers and traders with a number of backend and integrated services, from operational and logistical infrastructure such as storage and shipping to an online marketplace to host their products. The company uses latest technology including AI and data science to enable first time sellers to start and scale their online business smoothly.

“The Mena region is one of the most exciting right now and we believe there’s a great opportunity for Taager to replicate its unique data-driven approach for further growth across the region,” Jim Breyer, founder and chief executive of the US-based Breyer Capital, said.

Mena based start-ups secured investments worth $1.2bn in the first half of 2021, up 64 per cent compared to the same period last year, according to the latest report from data platform Magnitt. Thirty one per cent of the total investments were made by international investors.

The Egyptian social e-commerce market is forecast to be worth more than $14.8bn by 2024, according to Taager.