Cairo-based Paymob raises $18.5 million in funding, the largest ever Series A fundraise by an Egyptian fintech startup company

Paymob, a Cairo, Egypt-based fintech startup and Egypt’s market-leading digital payments provider, announced today it has closed an $18.5 million in Series A funding round, the largest Series A fundraise by an Egyptian company.

The round was led by Global Ventures, the UAE-based venture capital firm. It also included A15, a leading tech investment fund, and FMO, the Dutch entrepreneurial development bank. Paymob will use the new capital infusion proceeds to continue expanding its merchant network, meet the increasing demand, enhance its suite of products further, fuel its regional expansion efforts.

Founded in 2015 by Alain El Hajj, Islam Shawky, and Mostafa Menessy, Paymob is a regional digital payments enabler that builds payments infrastructure technologies empowering the underserved with access to financial services. Paymob is bridging the financial inclusion gap in the MEA region by enabling businesses of all sizes to benefit from the power of digital payments and what it unlocks.

Paymob empowers underserved SMEs with improved and more accessible digital payments offerings as part of the Central Bank of Egypt’s efforts and initiatives towards nationwide digital financial inclusion. The Company will accelerate its expansion in Saudi Arabia and other markets across the region, in 2021.

“We couldn’t be more excited for Paymob’s next phase of growth; the market opportunity in the region is unprecedented. The large digital payments gap still exists and we are delighted to be working with progressive-thinking regulators to address this. This latest capital raise will accelerate our progress to reducing the digital payments bottleneck. All our existing investors have increased their holdings, and we thank them both for their support and the confidence they have in our business model and track record of execution,” Paymob’s CEO and co-founder, Islam Shawky said.

Paymob’s mobile wallets infrastructure processes over 85% market share of transactions throughput in the Egyptian market and serves merchants across five different markets including Kenya, Pakistan, and Palestine. Paymob is the largest payment facilitator in Egypt and is the only Egyptian FinTech to expand beyond its local market.

In payment acceptance, Paymob’s monthly revenue grew over 5x in 2020, and its technology is used across economic sectors by over 35,000 local Egyptian and global merchants, such as Swvl, ElGouna, Tradeline, LG, Samsonite, Aeropostale, Befit, Breadfast, Gourmet, and the American University of Cairo. Paymob’s annual Total Payment Volume processed is now over $5 billion.

Global Ventures’ General Partner, Basil Moftah, said, “We are delighted to lead this momentous FinTech fundraise in the region. Paymob has a perfect combination of high-quality technology, a product customers increasingly cannot do without, and an outstanding management team. Their market opportunity is also huge; Egypt’s transformation to a cashless society is being enabled by the unique products Paymob has built. We look forward to continuing supporting their expansion.”