Series A

Series B

Seed

Others

Asia (ex. GCC & Levant)

Levant

Riyadh

Bill Bottoms

Matt Theall

Sultan Bin Khaled

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Investment in Startup

Uncover Riyad TAQNIA Fund's funding activity and portfolio companies. Find tailored investor profiles on Lucidity Insights.

Riyad TAQNIA Fund

E-Commerce

Transportation

Finance

Technology

AI/IoT

Foodtech

Software Dev/Test

Industry

Other

Riyad Taqnia Fund (RTF) is a collaboration between Riyad Capital and Taqnia, making RTF a global venture capital fund that focuses on investing in technology startups.

Pre-IPO

TruKKer

Logistics

Freight Service

Supply Chain Management

TruKKer is a technology-enabled truck aggregator that operates multiple truck types for multiple end markets.

Series C

Foodics

Foodics is a restaurant management system that manages sales, transactions, inventory, employee schedules, and customer relationships.

Unifonic

Support & Management Services

Marketing/Sales

Customer Experience

Customer engagement platform that unifies communication channels to enable organizations to delight customers.

Eureka

Digital & ICT

Big Data

Analytics

Machine Learning

Eureka is an information technology company that specializes in data analytics, big data, and artificial intelligence.

Dubai

Beehive

Fintech

Investment

P2P Lending

Beehive is a peer-to-peer lending platform that provides an online marketplace where individual investors can lend money to small and medium-sized businesses in the UAE.

Souqalmal

Souqalmal provides financial comparison site for money management. Souqalmal.com is the leading financial comparison site in the Middle East with operations in Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE.

Haseel

Marketplace

Food and Beverage

Haseel is a fresh fruits and vegetables ecommerce platform

Makkah

DokkanAfkar

Retail & Wholesale

DokkanAfkar.com was created by a group of passionate guys who love and appreciate creativity, design and ideas.

Al Khobar

ALWANS

Funding

Advisory and Consulting

Entrepreneurship

ALWANS is a leading saudi company with diverse interests and capabilities.

B8AK Digital Technologies

Mobile Apps

Management

Residential

B8ak is an online services marketplace aimed at homeowners and landlords in Saudi Arabia, and Bahrain and provides access to handymen and service providers.

Amman

Arabot

Artificial Intelligence

arabot an intelligent chatbot, A.I and Machine Learning Company

SURE International Technology

Mile

Mile Solutions

Logistics & Storage

SaaS

Mile helps fleet operators supercharge their processes with an integrated logistics & commerce platform.

Foodics, a Saudi cloud-based point-of-sale system for F&B businesses has raised $4 million in fresh funds, the startup announced today. The Pre-Series B investment comes from Riyadh Taqnia Fund (RTF), Kuwait-based Fatih Capital, and Riyadh-based Tech Invest Com and Naseel Holding. The round takes Foodics’ total investment raised so far to $8 million. The startup had raised its $4 million Series A in 2017.

Saudi-based Foodics raises $4 million to expand its point-of-sale software for restaurants to all types of retail businesses, will also launch a payment processing device

Saudi-based Foodics has raised $4 million in its Series A round. This is the first-ever external funding for the startup and was led by Saudi VCs: Raed Venture & Riyad TAQNIA Fund (RTF). Naseel Holding & 500 Startups also participated in the round.

Saudi-based restaurant management startup Foodics raises $4 million

Saudi Arabia-based engagement platform Unifonic has raised a $125 million Series B round led by Softbank Vision Fund 2 and Sanabil. 

The investment marks Softbank’s first direct investment in a Saudi-based startup and its second in the Middle East after Kitopi.

Founded in 2006 by Ahmed Hamdan and Hassan Hamdan, Unifonic’s technology integrates customer communication channels including text, voice, messaging and web into a single platform to enable companies to communicate directly with customers. 

The startup raised $21 million in its Series A round in 2018 and has since quadrupled in size, processing more than 10 billion transactions on its platform, annually. 

This latest round of investment will fund Unifonic product development and hiring in order to expand into new markets around the globe. 

Press release:

Unifonic, the Riyadh headquartered customer engagement platform, today announces its $125M Series B funding round, led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Sanabil Investments. Unifonic’s solutions integrate customer communication channels including text, voice, messaging and web into a single platform to enable companies to create stronger customer relationships. 

Consumers expect brands, governments, banks and organisations to connect with them over a growing number of channels. As newer channels emerge, and user preferences change over time, organisations rely on Unifonic to maximise customer engagement and optimise communication returns on investment.

From SMS for online banking to WhatsApp vaccination requests, Unifonic empowers organisations to transform customer experience while allowing them to focus on core business activities without maintaining costly communication infrastructures.

The round sets a new Series B investment record for technology startups in the Middle East, strengthening Unifonic’s leadership and growth potential in emerging markets. It also marks SoftBank’s first direct investment in a Saudi-based company and further consolidates Sanabil’s ambitions to invest in high-growth, high-impact technology start-ups in the country.

Faisal Rehman, Managing Partner for SoftBank Investment Advisers, said; “Consumers and businesses are increasingly sophisticated in how they communicate digitally, but this has created fragmentation across multiple emerging channels. Unifonic’s technology manages this complexity into a single platform, enabling enterprise clients to form closer relationships with their customers. Our investment team on the ground in Riyadh has followed Unifonic for some time and we have witnessed first-hand the company’s progress in establishing significant market leadership in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. We look forward to supporting the Unifonic team in scaling the platform across the Middle East and other emerging markets.”

A spokesperson for Sanabil Investments added: “Unifonic is poised to play a significant role in accelerating digital transformation initiatives for public and private enterprise in the Middle East. And so, we wanted to be a part of their journey, resulting in one of our largest investments in a high growth, high impact technology company in Saudi Arabia. We believe we can play a significant part in strengthening their strategic position and supporting their future international growth, while aligning with the country’s vision of fostering innovation.”

Less than three years after raising the largest Series A funding round in the Middle East at the time, Unifonic has quadrupled in size and now processes over 10 billion transactions on their platform, annually. Unifonic plans to continue this growth trajectory and will be accelerating product development and hiring in order to expand into new markets around the globe whilst bolstering its leading market share across the Middle East.

Ahmed Hamdan, founder and CEO at Unifonic highlighted; “At Unifonic our mission has always been to empower organisations to engage and communicate seamlessly with their customers. I couldn’t be prouder to see our solutions making such a positive impact and reaffirming that mission. This raise is an important milestone in our journey, it will allow us to scale our offerings and expand our reach to enable more organisations to connect with customers reliably and effectively. Our team is our anchor and together we aim to continue this journey and serve our clients in the best ways possible.”

Saudi's Unifonic raises $125 million Series B from Softbank and Sanabil

Saudi Arabia-based engagement platform Unifonic has raised a $125 million Series B round led by Softbank Vision Fund 2 and Sanabil.


The investment marks Softbank’s first direct investment in a Saudi-based startup and its second in the Middle East after Kitopi.

Founded in 2006 by Ahmed Hamdan and Hassan Hamdan, Unifonic’s technology integrates customer communication channels including text, voice, messaging and web into a single platform to enable companies to communicate directly with customers. 

The startup raised $21 million in its Series A round in 2018 and has since quadrupled in size, processing more than 10 billion transactions on its platform, annually. 

This latest round of investment will fund Unifonic product development and hiring in order to expand into new markets around the globe. 

Press release:

Unifonic, the Riyadh headquartered customer engagement platform, today announces its $125M Series B funding round, led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2 and Sanabil Investments. Unifonic’s solutions integrate customer communication channels including text, voice, messaging and web into a single platform to enable companies to create stronger customer relationships. 

Consumers expect brands, governments, banks and organisations to connect with them over a growing number of channels. As newer channels emerge, and user preferences change over time, organisations rely on Unifonic to maximise customer engagement and optimise communication returns on investment.

From SMS for online banking to WhatsApp vaccination requests, Unifonic empowers organisations to transform customer experience while allowing them to focus on core business activities without maintaining costly communication infrastructures.

The round sets a new Series B investment record for technology startups in the Middle East, strengthening Unifonic’s leadership and growth potential in emerging markets. It also marks SoftBank’s first direct investment in a Saudi-based company and further consolidates Sanabil’s ambitions to invest in high-growth, high-impact technology start-ups in the country.

Faisal Rehman, Managing Partner for SoftBank Investment Advisers, said; “Consumers and businesses are increasingly sophisticated in how they communicate digitally, but this has created fragmentation across multiple emerging channels. Unifonic’s technology manages this complexity into a single platform, enabling enterprise clients to form closer relationships with their customers. Our investment team on the ground in Riyadh has followed Unifonic for some time and we have witnessed first-hand the company’s progress in establishing significant market leadership in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. We look forward to supporting the Unifonic team in scaling the platform across the Middle East and other emerging markets.”

A spokesperson for Sanabil Investments added: “Unifonic is poised to play a significant role in accelerating digital transformation initiatives for public and private enterprise in the Middle East. And so, we wanted to be a part of their journey, resulting in one of our largest investments in a high growth, high impact technology company in Saudi Arabia. We believe we can play a significant part in strengthening their strategic position and supporting their future international growth, while aligning with the country’s vision of fostering innovation.”

Less than three years after raising the largest Series A funding round in the Middle East at the time, Unifonic has quadrupled in size and now processes over 10 billion transactions on their platform, annually. Unifonic plans to continue this growth trajectory and will be accelerating product development and hiring in order to expand into new markets around the globe whilst bolstering its leading market share across the Middle East.

Ahmed Hamdan, founder and CEO at Unifonic highlighted; “At Unifonic our mission has always been to empower organisations to engage and communicate seamlessly with their customers. I couldn’t be prouder to see our solutions making such a positive impact and reaffirming that mission. This raise is an important milestone in our journey, it will allow us to scale our offerings and expand our reach to enable more organisations to connect with customers reliably and effectively. Our team is our anchor and together we aim to continue this journey and serve our clients in the best ways possible.”

Those of you familiar with the incredible rise of Twilio, which came along to utterly disrupt the communications world, will be interested to hear that another player plans to do the same, but this time in the staid and tricky area of emerging markets.

Unifonic, which has been dubbed “the Twilio of emerging markets” has today closed a $21M Series A funding round led by Saudi Technology Ventures (STV), and the emerging market specialist fund Endeavor Catalyst, which is backed by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, among others. Other participants include RTF ELM, and Raed Ventures.

At $500M, STV is the largest VC fund in the region, and anchored by the Saudi Telecom Company (STC), the largest telecom company in the Middle East. Former Googler turned VC Abdulrahman Tarabzouni lead this round.

As far as we can tell, the is the largest Series A funding in the history of the Middle East technology sector. Appropriately, it shows the sheer growth in the region and comes on the heels of our recent and highly successful TechCrunch Startup Battlefield MENA in Beirut, as well as the Series C round announced by the “Uber for Doctors” in MENA Vezeeta’s Series C.

The capital will be used by Unifonic to scale the company across the MENA region and globally, and invest in the platform.

Unifonic is similar to Twilio in that it is a B2B cloud communications platform, a space that is sometimes called Communications Platform as a Service (CPaaS).
With 100+ employees spread across nine regional offices, and over 5,000 B2B clients, many of whom are giants in the MENA region, such as Souq.com, Aramex, Al Jazeera, HSBC, Uber, FedEx, Carrefour and others, they are the MENA region’s clear No.1 in this arena.

The company was started by two brothers, Hassan and Ahmed Hamdan, who were selected as high-impact Endeavor Entrepreneurs in 2013. They now regularly compete against their European counterpart, MessageBird, which recently raised $60M (led by Accel and Atomico), and their US benchmark, Twilio.

Riyad TAQNIA Fund

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Riyad TAQNIA Fund

Funding Deals, by Startup Growth Stage

Funding Deals, by Region

No. of Portfolio Companies

Total No. of Investments Globally, by Year

We Invest in Startups in the Following Stages

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Top 10 sectors we invest in

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Executive Team Members

About

Legal

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or Investments