<div>During his visit to Jordan, <a href="https://www.worldbank.org/en/home">World Bank Group</a> President Ajay Banga met with young entrepreneurs "<a href="https://www.habaybna.net/">Habaybna</a>, <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/neurotech-smarteye/">Smart Eye</a>, <a href="https://arabtherapy.com/ar?utm_term=arab%20therapy&amp;utm_campaign=DE_ar_Search_Brand_Arab+Therapy_%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8+%D8%AB%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A8%D9%8A&amp;utm_source=adwords&amp;utm_medium=ppc&amp;hsa_acc=5831738712&amp;hsa_cam=19758176802&amp;hsa_grp=146847905219&amp;hsa_ad=650142890863&amp;hsa_src=g&amp;hsa_tgt=kwd-930296830943&amp;hsa_kw=arab%20therapy&amp;hsa_mt=e&amp;hsa_net=adwords&amp;hsa_ver=3&amp;gclid=CjwKCAiAuNGuBhAkEiwAGId4aqAVFNlKGMFfKYxMPVs7mixKG8NieOSIwwWf8DPL9BPBctKJBqhRQRoCKvAQAvD_BwE">Arab Therapy</a> and <a href="https://www.konn.tech/en/">Konn Technologies</a>, along with us Oasis500, <a href="https://issfjo.com/">ISSF,</a> <a href="https://www.flat6labs.com/Location/jordan/">Flat6Labs</a>, <a href="https://www.modee.gov.jo/Default/En">MODEE</a>, <a href="https://www.jkb.com/">Jordan Kuwait Bank</a> and <a href="https://www.amamventures.com/">Amam Ventures</a>, fostering innovation and creating jobs for women and youth in high potential sectors, , &nbsp; 11 February 2024. Photography by World Bank / Nabeel Darweesh.<br>خلال زيارته إلى الأردن ، التقى رئيس مجموعة البنك الدولي أجاي بانجا مع رواد الأعمال الشباب " <br>&nbsp; &nbsp;"<a href="https://arabtherapy.com/ar?utm_term=arab%20therapy&amp;utm_campaign=DE_ar_Search_Brand_Arab+Therapy_%D8%B9%D8%B1%D8%A8+%D8%AB%D9%8A%D8%B1%D8%A7%D8%A8%D9%8A&amp;utm_source=adwords&amp;utm_medium=ppc&amp;hsa_acc=5831738712&amp;hsa_cam=19758176802&amp;hsa_grp=146847905219&amp;hsa_ad=680868471255&amp;hsa_src=g&amp;hsa_tgt=kwd-930296830943&amp;hsa_kw=arab%20therapy&amp;hsa_mt=e&amp;hsa_net=adwords&amp;hsa_ver=3&amp;gclid=CjwKCAiAuNGuBhAkEiwAGId4atOt4vtmCD1Yd7rFm_tMcLzPEvxRHXkI86Ijtx8TYWlnlNCjeqf-UhoC5sYQAvD_BwE">عرب ثيرابي</a> و<a href="https://www.konn.tech/ar/">كُن تكنولوجيز</a> ، <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/neurotech-smarteye/">Smarty Eye</a> <a href="https://www.habaybna.net/">&nbsp;حبايبنا</a><br> ، <a href="https://www.jkb.com/ar">البنك الأردني الكويتي</a> ،<a href="https://www.modee.gov.jo/Default/Ar">وزارة الاقتصاد الرقمي والريادة</a> ، <a href="https://www.flat6labs.com/ar/Location/%d8%a7%d9%84%d8%a3%d8%b1%d8%af%d9%86/">&nbsp;Flat6labs</a> ،جنبا إلى جنب مع أويسس 500 ، <a href="https://issfjo.com/ar/">الصندوق الأردني للريادة</a> ، <a href="https://www.amamventures.com/ar/home">Amam Ventures</a><br> لتعزيز الابتكار وخلق فرص عمل للنساء والشباب في القطاعات ذات الإمكانات العالية ، 11 فبراير 2024. تصوير البنك الدولي / نبيل درويش</div>

World Bank President Meets Jordanian Entrepreneurs

رئيس مجموعة البنك الدولي يلتقي في رياديين أردنيين

<div>December 2022<br><br>Oasis500 is listed among Top 3 MENA's accelerators according to a <a href="https://magnitt.com/market-maps"><strong>magnitt report&nbsp;</strong></a></div>

Listed among Top 3 MENA's accelerator

أويسس500 تصنف ضمن المراتب الثلاث الأولى بين مسرعات الأعمال في المنطقة

<div>Oct 2022<br><br>Not shying away from investing in early stage; <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/oasis500/">Oasis500</a> contributes with over 32% of the deals from the Middles East, and comes in 2nd place among the top 3 investors leading the dealfow activity in MENA - according to the 2022 <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/company/magnitt/">MAGNiTT</a> research.</div>

Oasis500 listed among Top 3 Investors leading MENA's dealflow activity

أويسس500 تساهم بأكثر من 32% من دفق الصفقات الحاصلة في المشهد الريادي

<div>magnitt - Nov 1, 2022<br><br>The largely brick-and-mortar-dominated industry of education went through a revolution of sorts as the pandemic brought with it the perfect opportunity to digitize the sector. Online education or learning was a concept not yet popularized until a few years ago. It has been in the talks but never fully adopted or experimented with.<br><br>The pandemic further fueled the growth of the industry and by 2021, the sector had <a href="https://magnitt.com/funding-rounds?region=135277,135278&amp;location_id=5664,5674,5713,5740,5746,5751,5755,5758,5778,5791,5794,5802,5812,5832,5841,5847,5856&amp;industry_id=14&amp;date_raised=^%3E=2018-1-1&amp;date_raised=^%3C=2018-12-31&amp;verification_status=1&amp;search_id=1639?utm_source=cta&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=ResearchArticle">crossed the $50M mark recording a YoY growth of 103% compared to the year before</a>. Another factor solidifying EdTech growth’s scale is the number of deals. From <a href="https://magnitt.com/funding-rounds?region=135277,135278&amp;location_id=5664,5674,5713,5740,5746,5751,5755,5758,5778,5791,5794,5802,5812,5832,5841,5847,5856&amp;industry_id=14&amp;date_raised=^%3E=2018-1-1&amp;date_raised=^%3C=2018-12-31&amp;verification_status=1&amp;search_id=1639?utm_source=cta&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=ResearchArticle">closing 14 deals in 2017 amounting to $4M to raising $28M across 35 deals</a>, the sector has managed to capture investor interest, especially in the Early-Stage. Investor traction has had a major role to play in the sector’s rise with names like 500 Global, EdVentures, Flat6Labs, and Oasis500 investing in the most number of deals. <br><br><a href="https://magnitt.com/news/sizing-mena-s-edtech-market-53737"><strong>Read magnitt's full artice</strong></a></div>

Sizing MENA's EdTech Market: Oasis500 among most deals investors

التكنولوجيا التعليمية: أويسس500 ضمن أكثر المستثمرين في شركات ذلك المجال

<div>May 30, 2022<br><br>Jordan-based streetwear brand <a href="https://magnitt.com/startups/jobedu-19241?utm_source=cta&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=Funding">Jobedu</a>, gets acquired by US based Web3 company <a href="https://magnitt.com/startups/novajax-66576?utm_source=cta&amp;utm_medium=website&amp;utm_campaign=Funding">Novajax</a>. Jobedu is an Endeavor company founded in Amman, Jordan in 2007. It is a Middle East based streetwear Arab pop culture lifestyle brand<br><br>Jobedu is part of Oasis500’s Creative Industries portfolio, as well as a 500 Startups company as part of the 500Falcons fund. Luma Fawaz, CEO of Oasis500, shared her thoughts on the acquisition, “The acquisition of Jobedu reflects Novajax's insight into what's distinctive about the brand and its creative community and cross-sight about the complementarity, revealing colossal value.&nbsp; We are excited about what's next!”.<br><br><a href="https://magnitt.com/news/novajax-acquires-jobedu-53454?fbclid=IwAR0M0Ce52_Ksg3oG_NWePeCbkMJDcXqGXKLZBRZ_URvn_AE1F6rC42nJRyo"><strong>Read the full article at magnitt</strong></a><strong><br></strong><br>Magnitt mentioned Jobedu as one of&nbsp; <a href="https://magnitt.com/news/mena-2022-international-exiters-53476"><strong>MENA 2022 YTD: Oldest International Exiters</strong></a></div><div><br><br><br></div>

US-based Novajax acquires Jordan's Jobedu

نوفاجاكس الأمريكية تستحوذ على جوبدو

<div>July 2020 - In a magnitt report: Oasis500 is one of the MENA region's most active investors in H1 2020.<br><br>read full article at <a href="https://magnitt.com/research/h1-2020-mena-venture-investment-report-50714?fbclid=IwAR2ZlV6B3WrjSt3XdFTsMeB3IVSJVSfmD_BsESuFXYaYxhKZtj6UJA5a8g0">Magnitt</a></div>

Oasis500 comes in 2nd rank among top investors & accelerators in 2020

في تقرير: أويسس تحل في المرتبة الثانية ضمن أكثر المستثمرين نشاطا عام الجائحة

<div>Read full article of <a href="https://fsd-mena.org/news/mapping-the-top-mena-startup-accelerators-in-2021/">GIZ - Apr 21</a><br><br><strong>Jordan<br></strong><br></div><div>From business and financial developments, to government initiatives, the Jordanian entrepreneurship ecosystem has been emerging over the last decade, and here are the most important entities that support youth and innovation:<br><br></div><div><a href="https://oasis500.com/en/">Oasis500</a> is Amman-based leading early-stage investor and accelerator. Since launching in 2010, it has invested $8.65 million in 154 creative and technology startups. They graduated famous startups from different MENA countries like <em>Madfoatkon, Jamalon, Crowd analyzer and Tamatem</em>.<br><br></div>

GIZ mentions Oasis500 as one of MENA's most prominent accelerators

GIZ تذكر أويسس500 كأحدى المسرعات البارزة في المنطقة

<div>&nbsp;</div><div>إبراهيم المبيضين<br><br></div><div>عمان- تظهر آخر البيانات الرسمية التي أعلن عنها صندوق “اويسس 500” -الشركة المتخصصة في دعم وتمويل رواد الأعمال في الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا- أن استثمارات الصندوق منذ انطلاقته في الربع الأخير من العام 2010 وحتى نهاية العام الماضي 2020 (فترة عشرة أعوام) قد أسهمت في تطوير أعمال شركات ناشئة وفرت ما مجمله 4700 وظيفة مباشرة وغير مباشرة في الأردن.<br><br>وقال الصندوق، في مادة فيديوية نشرها مؤخرا على صفحته الرسمية على شبكة “فيسبوك” احتفالا بمرور عشرة أعوام على انطلاقته- إن إجمالي أعداد الوظائف التي خلقتها الشركات الناشئة التي استثمر فيها الصندوق توزعت بين 700 وظيفة مباشرة وأكثر من 4 آلاف وظيفة غير مباشرة ترتبط بالأعمال التي تقدمها الشركات الناشئة، وكان معظمها في المجال التقني أو يطوع التتقنية لخدمة قطاعات أخرى، الى جانب عدد من الشركات التي تعمل في مجال الصناعات الإبداعية.<br>وأوضح الصندوق أن هذا الرقم من الوظائف تأتى من دعمه ومساعدته وضخه لاستثمارات في 169 شركة ناشئة أردنية على مدار الأعوام العشرة الماضية، كان معظمها يعمل في المجال التقني أو يطوع التقنية في عملها أو يعمل في المجال الإبداعي.<br><br>وذكر أن إجمالي الاستثمارات التي ضخها الصندوق في هذه الشركات بلغ قرابة 9.9 مليون دولار، كما استطاع عدد من هذه الشركات أن يجذب استثمارات لاحقة بعد استثمار “اويسس 500” فيها.<br><br>وأوضح أن الصندوق، الذي انطلق في الربع الأخير من العام 2010 بدعم من صندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية، يعمل كمدير صندوق استثماري ومسرعة أعمال بهدف الارتقاء بمشهد ريادة الأعمال في الأردن ومساعدة الشركات الناشئة الأردنية للانطلاق عربيا وعالميا؛ حيث أطلق في شهر كانون الأول (ديسمبر) من العام 2010 صندوق الواحة للمشاريع الأول الذي استثمر في 125 شركة ناشئة أردنية، ومن ثم جرى إطلاق صندوق الواحة للتطوير والإبداع الذي كان موجها للصناعات الإبداعية واستثمر في 30 شركة ناشئة أردنية، ومن ثم جرى إطلاق صندوق الواحة للمشاريع الثاني في شهر كانون الأول (ديسمبر) من العام 2019 والذي استثمر حتى الآن في 14 شركة ناشئة أردنية، ليصبح مجموع الشركات الناشئة التي استثمر فيها الصندوق منذ انطلاقته حتى اليوم 169 شركة ناشئة.<br>وأشار الصندوق الى أن هذه الاستثمارات كانت نتاج منافسة واختيار من بين حوالي 16 ألف طلب للاستثمار تقدمت للصندوق في كل مراحله وصناديقه الفرعية.<br>وذكر الصندوق أن كل دولار تم استثماره في هذه الشركات الناشئة أسهم في جذب 8 دولارات من مستثمرين لاحقين خارجيين محليين أو عرب أو دوليين.<br>وأشار الى أن مجموع قيمة الشركات الفعالة التي استثمر فيها الصندوق بلغ قرابة 200 مليون دولار.<br><br>وقال الصندوق إن مشاركة المرأة في تأسيس الشركات الناشئة التي استثمر فيها بلغت نسبة تصل إلى 36 % من مجموع مؤسسي الشركات الناشئة.<br>ومن أهم ما يقدمه صندوق “اويسس 500″، برنامج تسريع الأعمال الذي يتم تقديمه للشركات التي يتم الاستثمار فيها وهو برنامج عملي مدته 6 أشهر، يهدف الى تقليل الوقت اللازم لوصول الشركات الناشئة الى السوق عن طريق التدريب والإرشاد في مجال إدارة الأعمال كالتخطيط والإدارة المالية والإرشاد التقني لضمان جودة المنتج وتطويره والدعم الداخلي من فريق “أويسس 500″ والتشبيك مع المستثمرين.<br><br>و”أويسس 500” هي مسرعة أعمال ومدير صندوق معني بالاستثمار في المراحل الأولية ومراحل التأسيس للمشاريع، تهدف إلى تعزيز بيئة ريادة الأعمال في الأردن ومنطقة الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا. ومن خلال توفير فرص ثمينة لرواد الأعمال الطموحين لسد الفجوة في المعرفة والخبرة، والحصول على التمويل، والتواصل مع المختصين في قطاعات الأعمال، وبناء شركاتهم الخاصة، تسعى “أويسس500” إلى احتضان الشركات القوية التي تطور منتجات وخدمات ذات قيمة مضافة، وتوفر فرص عمل، وتدر إيرادات، وتسهم في نهاية المطاف في الاقتصاد الوطني. <br><br><a href="https://alghad.com/%d8%a7%d8%b3%d8%aa%d8%ab%d9%85%d8%a7%d8%b1%d8%a7%d8%aa-%d8%a3%d9%88%d9%8a%d8%b3%d8%b3-500-%d8%aa%d9%88%d9%81%d8%b1-4700-%d9%88%d8%b8%d9%8a%d9%81%d8%a9-%d9%85%d8%a8%d8%a7%d8%b4%d8%b1%d8%a9-%d9%88/"><strong>اقرأ الخبر في الغد</strong></a></div>

Oasis500 investments creates 4700+ direct & indirect jobs

استثمارات “أويسس500” توفر 4700 وظيفة مباشرة وغير مباشرة

<div>December 2020&nbsp;<br><br>marks the 10th anniversary of Oasis500's first investment in a startup. During this decade, Oasis500 played a significant role in catalyzing the development of Jordan's entrepreneurial ecosystem and remains the lead pre-seed and seed stage investor in Jordan.&nbsp;</div><div>On this occasion, we extend our thanks to all the previous team members that contributed to the establishment of Oasis500. Many thanks to the startup founders that allowed us to be part of their journeys. We are also grateful to the many investors, mentors, and partners who supported us in our mission to support Jordan's innovation and entrepreneurship industry.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>This post will recap some of our key milestones and achievements and present our key learnings from the decade.&nbsp;</div><div>To date, Oasis500 has established and managed three funds; Oasis Ventures I (2011), Oasis Creative Industries (2015), and Oasis Ventures II (2019). Oasis500 has invested a total of $9.9 Million in 169 startups with a current aggregate value of $200M across the three funds. The funds are sector agnostic investing in a wide range of sectors, including but not limited to FinTech, EdTech, Enterprise SaaS, HealthTech, and eCommerce.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>Oasis500 is the investment partner of choice, investing time, knowledge, and money; the selected startups had access to business and technical support. Mentorship enabled them to raise significant follow-on funding rounds and expand regionally to be among the top regional startups in funding (<a href="https://www.forbesmiddleeast.com/list/the-middle-easts-50-most-funded-startups">see Forbes ME 50 Most Funded Startups</a>) and, more importantly, impact shaping the future. (see <a href="https://widgets.weforum.org/arabstartups/">WEF 100 Top Arab startups shaping the Fourth Industrial Revolution</a>).&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;The ripple effect is time changing, creating economic and social impact has driven us. Oasis500 created more than 700 job opportunities with a monthly average salary of USD 1,200 and created more than 4,000 indirect jobs. With a 38% overall success rate among startups, multiple founders established other startups or became highly productive employees; simultaneously, many startup employees have ventured into creating their startups, contributing to the new wave of entrepreneurship.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;We are also proud of the female representation in our portfolio, currently at 36%, exceeding the international average.</div><div>&nbsp;Over the years, the Oasis500 team has received and reviewed over 16,000 investment applications from aspiring founders. The pipeline is healthy, and we are excited to continue our support Journey. We have learned the art of selecting winning teams that have the potential to grow, the potential for innovative execution. &nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;Building on our learnings, we have revised our program and ticket size. Our investment program addresses the lack of capital that allows the founders to test and iterate products to achieve market fit at early stages. But most importantly, it addresses the lack of skill sets that allows them to build viable solutions and solid&nbsp; business and the lack of personal connections with global and local investors and corporate partners.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;We offer Investment tickets that grant the founding team financial freedom to concentrate on the business. We also provide bespoke venture-building support from market and sector experts and access to investors and partners' global network. Our support covers crucial criteria such as developing financial projections, testing and proving their concept, refining their target market, customer acquisition strategy, and much more. Ultimately, Oasis500 will help the selected startups attract capital.<br><br></div><div>&nbsp; We have also institutionalized our support post acceleration to introduce prime opportunities to connect with industry stakeholders and contribute to the startups' growth and expansion efforts.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;Currently, Oasis500 manages and deploys funding from its active fund Oasis Ventures II. With a focus on quality early-stage startups rather than quantity, we have invested in two cohorts so far, with the third investment cycle concluding early next week. Moving forward, Oasis500's team looks forward to reaping the returns from its investments in matured companies and raising more funding for its active funds and establishing new funds to fill the pre-seed and seed-stage investment gap in Jordan.</div><div>&nbsp;"What keeps us going is the multiplier effect of our time and money, that in turn lays the foundation for something much bigger."</div><div><br></div>

Oasis500 Celebrates 10 Year Anniversary

أويسس500 تحتفل بعامها العاشر

<div><a href="https://arabcrunch.wordpress.com/2010/06/03/oasis-500-a-startup-accelerator-to-launch-in-august/"><strong>In an article by Arab Crunch</strong></a><strong> - 2010 </strong><br><br>Last year was a turning point for the technology and internet industry in the Arab world when Yahoo acquired Maktoob, so I might call it “The Start Year”. This year we are seeing more programmers to fund and support startups in different Arab countries.<br><br></div><div>In Jordan and the Arab world in general there are only a few business plan competitions from organizations such Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship, ASTF, and MIT Arab Business Plan Competition.<br><br></div><div>Many bright entrepreneurs won the competitions, but many of the business plans remained on the shelfs as no seed funding was available. To that end Dr. Usama Fayyad, Former Chief Data Officer of Yahoo and current Chairman of Arab portal <a href="http://d1g.com/">d1g </a>told ArabCrunch today he is launching Oasis 500 to address the gap of seed and early stage funding shortage.<br><br></div><div>Oasis 500 is a type of accelerator similar to <a href="http://arabcrunch.com/2008/04/12-ways-to-help-you-kick-start-your-business-through-early-stage-funds-incubators-accelerators.html">Y Combinator</a> as it offers funding and incubation. Oasis 500&nbsp; aims to push 500 startups in Jordan in 5 years and will offer several programs starting with training courses for entrepreneurs with ideas.<br><br></div><div>The courses will include business plan development, marketing and sales etc. and would last for 4- 6 weeks.<br><br></div><div>According to Usama the training program will start around August of this year and will take a quota of around 100 entrepreneurs for several rounds every year ( any one with a tech idea according to Usama.) At the end of each program Oasis 500 will choose 10 ideas to invest in with an average of 10,000 Jordanian Dinars per idea and provide incubation (offices) for a period of 2 months.&nbsp; If the startup is qualified there will be additional investment of an average of 50,000 USD.<br><br></div><div>Oasis 500 will also bring an umbrella for all the angel networks in Jordan so that startups can more easily pitch to them.&nbsp; So an additional capital investments can go from 100,000 to 500,000 USD depending in the company or deal.<br><br></div><div>Usama told AC that Oasis 500 will be closing its first fund, of about 6 million USD in September this year.<br><br></div><div>Next week more details about the Oasis program, who is behind it, their qualifications, criteria, etc. will be posted when I interview Ussama in few days again.</div>

Remembering: Oasis500 a Startup Accelerator to Launch By August 2010 In Jordan

وقفة للذكرى: أويسس500، مسرعة أعمال ستطلق عام 2010 في الأردن

<div>Jordan, with its progressive startups and small population, could be a good regional test market for fintech products looking to head to the GCC.<br><br>Or as Oasis500 assistant investment manager Faisal Bitar puts it, it's a good market for cheap mistakes.<br><br>“The main purchase power is in the GCC,” he said.<br><br>Jordanian accelerator and investor Oasis500 is eyeing the fintech sector and recently held a series of workshops to identify entrepreneurs and boost startups.<br><br>Bitar’s GCC comment was also one of prerequisites for fintech product ideas brought up at the workshops. Oasis500 wanted only ones that would be scalable beyond Jordan’s borders.<br><br>The accelerator and investor has been looking at fintech since they made investments in startups like Greenwallet, Madfooatcom and Finengin.<br><br>“Banks need to innovate,” he said “Since credit cards and ATMs there has been no real innovation.”<br><br>A recent series of workshops were held in collaboration with Madfooatcom and investors Wamda Capital, hosting a mixture of bank employees and finance types, all looking to learn more about creating and building fintech products.<br>Jenny Ahlzen of regional tech investors Acceleratortech was pleased to see a diverse range of sectors being tackled in the workshop, such as algorithmic trading, core banking solutions, peer-to-peer lending platforms, wealth management solutions, insurance and financial education.<br><br>Fintech frenzy<br><br>Fintech is not a sector to be sniffed at. In 2016 a report from Accenture said that first quarter global fintech investment grew 67 percent year-over-year to $5.3 billion, with 62 percent of investments went to ventures in Europe and Asia.<br><br>Jordan is proving, at least to those involved in last week’s workshop, to be a good test market for fintech products. With companies such as Hyperpay and Ideal Ratings, both Acceleratortech investments, Ahlzen said they were starting to see real traction.<br><br>“Rather than resisting the fintech movement, the Jordanian financial system is proving willing to engage and explore ways to cooperate with startups, some examples being local banks investing in Madfooatcom, Bank Al Etihad supporting Liwwa, Arab Bank sponsoring the Oasis500 fintech workshop and Ahli Bank having set up an IT innovation center in the KHBP etcetera,” she said.<br><br>Getting people banking<br><br>The average consumer is the online generation, they’re not going into banks. There are also the unbanked and the underbanked. All are areas Bitar wanted to address.<br>And it’s true, for Jordan at least. According to USAID only 25 percent of Jordanians have a bank account. But even Payfort’s Mohammad Al Rifai says Jordan is one of the more progressive in the region. “Telcos are looking to support startups and so is the Central Bank,” he said.<br><br>Ahlzen said that although Jordan was at an advantage with stability and security, the challenges were still fighting the brain drain and retaining talent.<br><br>“Other challenges facing fintech startups (other than the obvious ones being regulatory, financial illiteracy and lack of trust) would be timing the market,” she told Wamda. “From our experience, many companies have had excellent ideas but the market just wasn’t ready for the product at the time (slow market adoption) so companies need to be mindful of the possibility that it might take longer to scale than initially planned and thus needs to have a sound longer term strategy in place.”<br><br>Oasis500 will see the final pitches this coming weekend and beyond that, they will not stop. Bitar said they have plans to lead and manage a fintech forum with the Central Bank to come up with a regulatory landscape, working with startups.<br><br>Read more at <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2016/08/oasis500-fintech-hunt"><strong>Wamda</strong></a></div>

Oasis500, on a fintech hunt

أويسس500، في بحث عن التكنولوجيا المالية

<div>Amman-based accelerator and seed investor Oasis500 has announced partial exit from Jordanian edtech startup Little Thinking Minds. The announcement was made last week.<br><br>Founded in 2004 by Rama Kayyali and Lamia Tabbaa who were joined by the third co-founder Salwa Katkhuda afterwards, Little Thinking Minds originally used to create educational content in form of videos and other things for children, before transforming recently into an educational technologies and products provider, that creates digital solutions and platforms with the aim of improving learning outcomes for school aged children in Middle East &amp; North Africa and beyond.<br><br>The startup had raised $1.265 million Series A in December last year at a valuation of [redacted]. According to the publicly available data, Oasis 500 was the first investor in Little Thinking Minds – having invested $230,000 in 2011.<br><br>Luma Fawaz, the recently appointed CEO of Oasis500, commenting on the occasion, said, “Our objective as an early stage investor in startups is to sell shares in these companies after reaching certain level of growth that usually takes a seven year period. The first investment fund was established in 2011 and has matured and we’ve started selling our shares in the companies that are now in their growth stage.”<br><br>“Little Thinking Minds and the great team behind it are an inspiration to all Jordanian startups,” she added.<br><br>Rama Kayyali, Co-founder and CEO of the startup, said, “We’re very proud to have been a success story for Oasis500 and certainly joining their accelerator was a turning point for us. Now in our growth phase, we plan to expand our product portfolio as well as empowering our product platforms with data tools and analytics that will improve student learning journeys and their outcomes. We wish to capitalize on our strong traction, perfect the user journey in terms of learning outcomes and user experience, and become the educational platform and partner of choice across the region.”<br><br>Last month, Bahrain-based angel network Tenmou had also announced its partial exit from restaurant booking platform Eat. The exit had generated 20x return for Tenmou.<br><br><a href="https://www.menabytes.com/oasis500-little-thinking-minds-exit/"><strong>Read more</strong></a></div>

Amman based Oasis500 announces partial exit from Little Thinking Minds

أويسس500 تعلن تخارجها الجزئي من المفكرون الصغار

<div>2010<br><br>(Office of Her Majesty- Press Department- Amman) Her Majesty Queen Rania Al Abdullah attended today the launch of Oasis500's new investment track, the "Creative Industries Fund", which will support and invest in artistic and cultural entrepreneurship. The fund will target talented entrepreneurs in all governorates of the kingdom, and aims to help them transform their ideas into fruitful projects that can contribute to the Jordanian economy.<br><br>Her Majesty also inaugurated and toured the Oasis500 "Entrepreneurial Talent Exhibition", an exhibition which included 20 artistic creations by 20 different Jordanian entrepreneurs. Her Majesty reviewed the ideas behind the different projects which ultimately aim to harvest, through the medium of arts and culture, sustainable and income generating projects that serve economic development in Jordan.<br><br>Queen Rania met with the artists who participated in the exhibition and expressed her admiration of their creations, adding that their talent and thirst for success is evident in their work.<br><br>The Queen was accompanied by Dr. Omar Razzaz, Chairman of King Abdullah II Fund for Development (KAFD), H.E. Marwan Juma, Oasis500 Vice Chairman, and Mr. Qais Qatamin, Director of KAFD.<br><br>Following the tour, Her Majesty watched a presentation explaining the goals and ambitions of the new fund which was launched with the cooperation of KAFD. The fund will be working with around 100 experts and 70 investors which will provide entrepreneurs with the guidance and financial support that they need to complete their projects. The fund currently hopes to invest in 20 companies.<br><br>Her Majesty pointed out that the art scene in Jordan has great potential in contributing to the development of the Jordanian economy, stressing the importance of building partnerships between entrepreneurs and investors so that new opportunities in this field may better be explored.<br><br>Mr. Yousef Hamidaddin, Oasis500 CEO, stated that the Creative Industries Fund was launched after Oasis500 managed to identify the art market's need for support and investment, as well as the need for expertise, such as that of Oasis500, in the field of business enhancement. Mr. Hamidaddin added that he believes that after spending a little more than three years focusing on projects in the fields of communications, information technology, and digital content, the time is right for Oasis500 to embark onto new adventures exploring new industries, adding that entrepreneurship is not limited to any specific field.<br><br>He also pointed out that through this new track, Oasis500 aims at producing arts and media projects to support the economy in Jordan. He stressed that the fund will focus on supporting talented youth in all governorates in order to achieve sustainable development in the kingdom.<br><br>Dr. Omar Al-Razzaz said that supporting young entrepreneurs is a top priority at KAFD especially given that the country's future rests on the shoulders of its youth. He added that transforming entrepreneurs from jobseekers to job owners helps decrease unemployment rates and improves the national economy. Dr. Razzaz also touched on the importance of such projects in increasing exports from Jordan to other countries.<br><br>Mr. Omar Al-Sharif, the Creative Entrepreneurship Project Director at Oasis500, said that the new investment track will support entrepreneurs in different creative sectors, including industrial design, architectural engineering, fashion and furniture design, publishing and electronic journalism, music, movie making and theatrical arts, digital art and animation, as well as handicrafts industries.<br><br>Mr. Al-Sharif explained that this track consists of different programs including: "Training in business skills and professional communication", "Training in the field of the required area of specialization", "Primary investment", "Business enhancement", "Creating new opportunities and launching their companies in global and Arab regional markets", "Identifying new guides within the required scope of specialization", "Introduce participants to publishing houses, and introducing them to new investors".<br><br>He also pointed out that Oasis500 has launched a dual language program, in both Arabic and in English, so as to reach as many entrepreneurs as possible across the kingdom.<br><br>The "Creative Industries Fund", is the third of two other investment tracks which Oasis500 has been working on since its establishment in 2010. The first two tracks focus mainly on enhancing entrepreneurial business ideas in the fields of communications and information technology.<br><br><a href="https://www.queenrania.jo/en/media/press/queen-rania-inaugurates-entrepreneurship-talent-exhibition-oasis500"><strong>Read more</strong></a></div>

Remembering: Queen Rania Inaugurates the Entrepreneurship Talent Exhibition at Oasis500

وقفة للذكرى: بحضور الملكة رانيا "أويسس500" تطلق مسارا استثماريا جديدا يستهدف القطاعات الابداعية وجلالتها تفتتح معرض الريادة الابداعية

<div>12-10-2010</div><div><br></div><div>Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - Oasis 500, The Entrepreneurial Projects and Investments Company, announced today in a graduation ceremony taking place at the MENA ICT Forum under the patronage of His Excellency Mr. Marwan Juma, the Minister of Information and Communication Technology, that 12 out of 33 entrepreneurs have survived the first entrepreneurial boot camp training program, and an overall of 200 applicants. The selected entrepreneurs were part of a unique experience as they underwent an intensive boot camp of training and mentorship geared towards building the capacity of Jordanian entrepreneurs.<br><br>Oasis 500, which was founded in May of this year, with investments from the King Abdullah II Fund for Development (KAFD), Jordanian venture capital firms, leading Jordanian technology companies, as well as angel investors, had launched its operations in August by announcing that it is accepting applications for its entrepreneurship program with the goal of helping accelerate no less than 500 start-ups by 2015.<br><br>The graduation recognized the first group wave of entrepreneurs.<br>“Oasis 500 is based on a model where we companies for funding and incubation based on the results of an intensive entrepreneurship Boot Camp program designed to provide business, behavioral, and fund raising training to candidates,” said Dr. Usama Fayyad, Executive Chairman of the Oasis 500. “The quality and capability of all the participating entrepreneurs were very encouraging, validating the potential of Jordanian entrepreneurs, and we will have high expectations for many of our graduating class.”<br><br>Oasis 500 provides three major activities in addition to its Training Boot Camp: An Investment and Incubation Program, an intensive Mentorship Program, and a regional Angel Network of Investors to help eligible companies secure funding and to encourage angel investment in technology.<br>“The Oasis 500 model is one that can tangibly transform opportunity in Jordan for entrepreneurs needing to hone their skills at building special businesses. It also serves as a platform for local, regional, and international stakeholders to participate in the early stages of high-growth prospects in the Jordanian ICT sector” said Mr. Emile Cubeisy, board member of Oasis 500 and Managing Director of IV Holdings.<br>“We aim to raise our capital by USD $6 million, and over the next five years raise an additional USD $30M as we scale our operation”, added Dr. Fayyad. “We aim to make about 500 initial investments in startup companies over the coming 5 years, and these will come from thousands of ideas we will review, consider, evaluate, and filter over the coming 5 years.”<br>“The potential of Jordan’s ICT sector is clear, and we are confident that this model will accelerate the development of more success stories in technology startups in our sector”, said Mr. Aiman Mazahreh, board member of Oasis 500 and Chairman of intaj, Jordan’s IT Association. “We hope that these successful startups will transform the perception of Jordanian start-ups, by setting a standard for what our entrepreneurs can achieve when the right environment is in place. Jordan’s got a track record of success and we are striving to ensure that more entrepreneurs can participate in this sector’s potential”.<br><br>“We hope to change the investment culture in this region from having a strong focus on real estate and traditional businesses, to turn to the more exciting and often significantly higher return area of ICT and Digital media”, continued Dr. Fayyad. “Our angel network, which will be launching soon, will aim to a new tradition of angel investments in technology startups.”<br><br>Oasis500 presence at MENA ICT was also highlighted by two competitions it created for the forum. The first competition, with the partnership of Microsoft Jordan, was the Startup Pitch Session, where around seven of the top Jordanian startups presented their ideas to; Corporate Vice President of Evangelism at Microsoft Mr. Walid Abu-Hadba and Dr. Usama Fayyad, Oasis500 Executive Chairman. The Competition entitled startups to pitch for the Mircosoft BizSpark initiative, which was created to help startups gain a competitive advantage in the IT industry.<br><br>Oasis also created a second competition, where it offered startups and entrepreneurs with the chance to meet all the seasoned ICT experts at the MENAICT forum via offering them 30 free passes to the forum. Entrepreneurs were selected after they have submitted an online video explaining “Why they should be part of the MENAICT forum?”<br><br></div><div><a href="https://en.ammonnews.net/article/9901"><strong>Read more</strong></a></div>

Oasis500 Concludes Proceedings of the MENA ICT Forum with Announcements

أويسس500 تختتم مؤتمر MENA ICT بإعلان

<div><strong>Amman, June 2020</strong>: The Oasis Venture II fund, launched by Oasis500, the region's first startup accelerator and investment fund manager, has announced the names of the eight early-stage startups that have qualified for investments of up to $100,000 per company. The startups are <a href="http://decapolis.io/">AlHaq</a>, TakalamTech, Jordilight, FITELY, Pi Pharma, ByrdByte, Quiq Claim and Tanda.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Luma Fawaz, CEO at Oasis500, said: "We are excited that our family is getting bigger in these tough times! We continue our journey, despite the coronavirus pandemic, in supporting entrepreneurs and increasing their investment readiness. We also can't wait to showcase the graduates from our first cohort and their path to growth during our upcoming Digital Demo Day at the end of this month."</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>During this investment cycle, Oasis500 received 907 applications that had undergone a rigorous selection process. In the final stage of the qualification process, 16 candidates virtually pitched their startups to an investment committee made up of five experts from the financial, commercial and technical fields, who selected the eight companies eligible for funding&nbsp;</div><div>The startups that received the investments are from various sectors including HealthTech, PharmaTech, Energy, as well as Hardware and FinTech. Investment committee member Jameel Anz, commented: “It was a great opportunity to be part of the selection process for this cohort in which a great level of skill, innovation and diversity was displayed. A strong pipeline of startups led by ambitious and dedicated entrepreneurs culminated in a healthy competition and made the selection a close call. Wishing them all an enjoyable journey to success.”</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Oasis500 launched the Oasis Ventures II fund in July 2019, with the support and funding from King Abdullah II Fund for Development, Innovative Startups and SMEs Fund and Arab Bank, the fund aims to invest semi-annually in early-stage startups.</div>

Oasis500 Invests in New Cohort Despite Pandemic

أويسس500 تستثمر في فوج جديد رغم الجائحة

<div>The Oasis Venture II fund, launched by Oasis 500, the region's first startup accelerator and investment fund manager, has announced the names of the eight early-stage startups that have qualified for investments of up to $100,000 per company. The startups are <a href="https://www.controlcastapp.com/?fbclid=IwAR0QA4kIL-3l963KGVBKuYejiCvSXhfbUXZg5GTCrbFQmcXPrP49pQDaX9E">Controlcast</a>, <a href="http://decapolis.io/">Decapolis</a>, <a href="http://www.fitticoin.com/">FittiCoin</a>, <a href="http://ghoorcom.com/">Ghoorcom</a>, <a href="https://harreef.ai/">Harreef</a>, <a href="https://www.meemapps.com/">MeemApps</a>, <a href="http://www.orderera.com/">OrderEra</a>, and <a href="https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=io.tapshare.tapshareapp">TapShare</a>.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>All applications to the fund had undergone a rigorous selection process, during which 1,033 applications were examined and due diligence measures were conducted on 45 potential investments. In the final stage of the qualification process, 16 candidates pitched their startups to an independent investment committee made up of five experts in a variety of financial, commercial and technical fields, who selected the eight companies eligible for funding under the first investment cohort of the "Oasis Ventures II" fund.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>The startups that received the investments are: Controlcast, an innovative mobile app and online platform that lets businesses advertise on digital out-of-home screens instantly. Decapolis, a food supply chain quality assurance and safety certification platform utilizing blockchain technology. FittiCoin, a health focused mobile application incentivizing users through points and rewards to get active and adopt a healthier lifestyle. GhoorCom, an online marketplace that aims to empower farmers and wholesalers by marketing their products and linking them to retail stores, as well as providing payment and logistics solutions. Harreef develops AI-enabled chatbots and conversational solutions for hotels to provide seamless experiences to staying and prospective guests as well as a platform to streamline various hotel operations. MeemApps, a comprehensive business platform that provides business-related services, resources and business terminology in Arabic. OrderEra, a B2B online platform which connects distributors of fast moving consumer goods and points of sales in one place. Finally, TapShare, is an interactive social network that gives users access to advanced tools to edit and share content in a professional and engaging way.</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Luma Fawaz, CEO at Oasis 500, said: “The support from <strong>Oasis500</strong> is not limited to early-stage funding, these eight startups will undergo a hands-on six-month business acceleration program. The program aims to help these startups develop their products, improve their business model, as well as give them access to coaching and leverage networking opportunities with subject matter experts.”</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Laith Al-Qasem, CEO of the Innovative Startups and SMEs Fund (ISSF), said: "ISSF invested in the Oasis Ventures II fund as part of our institutional strategy to strengthen Jordan's entrepreneurship ecosystem and create an environment where these startups can grow into thriving, competitive businesses." He added, "These eight unique startups all share one striking similarity, they bring innovation to their respective fields, creating new technologies and solutions to solve pressing problems. Innovation is the cornerstone of sustainable institutional competitiveness."</div><div>&nbsp;</div><div>Oasis 500 launched the Oasis Venture II fund in July 2019 with the support and funding from the King Abdullah II Fund for Development, the Innovative Startups and SMEs Fund, and Arab Bank. The fund aims to invest semi-annually in early-stage startups.<br><br><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8iXJZxFYGJU&amp;t=5s"><strong>Watch here</strong></a></div>

Oasis500 Invests in 8 new startups

صندوق الواحة الثاني يستثمر في ثمان شركات ناشئة

<div>أعلنت «أويسس500»، الذراع الريادي لصندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية، عن إطلاق صندوق الواحة الثاني بدعم وتمويل من صندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية والصندوق الأردني للريادة والبنك العربي.<br>جاء ذلك خلال توقيع اتفاقية استثمار في صندوق الواحة الثاني، امس الأحد، بحضور وزير الاقتصاد الرقمي وريادة الأعمال مثنى غرايبة ورئيس مجلس أمناء صندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية المهندس علاء البطاينة، ورئيس مجلس إدارة الصندوق الأردني للريادة الدكتور محمد الجعفري، ونائب المدير العام التنفيذي للبنك العربي رندة الصادق، ورئيس مجلس إدارة أويسس500 مروان جمعة.<br><br><a href="https://www.addustour.com/articles/1087154-صندوق-الملك-عبداللـه-الثاني-للتنمية-يطلق-صندوقاً-استثمارياً-جديداً?search=oasis500">لقراءة المزيد</a></div>

King Abdullah II Fund launches a new investment fund

صندوق الملك عبداللـه الثاني للتنمية يطلق صندوقاً استثمارياً جديداً

<div>بعد مسيرة امتدت لأكثر من ثماني سنوات تخللها الكثير من العمل في مضمار دعم الشركات الريادية والاستثمار فيها وتطوير بيئة ريادة الأعمال في المملكة، أعلنت شركة “أويسس 500” عن إطلاقها صندوقها الاستثماري الثاني الذي يحمل اسم صندوق الواحة الثاني “OV2” الذي سيكون بحجم 15 مليون دولار (على مرحلتين أو إغلاقين؛ الإغلاق الأول الذي أنجز بقيمة 7 ملايين دولار).</div><div><br></div><div>&nbsp;وأعلنت “أويسس500” عن إطلاق صندوق الواحة الثاني بدعم وتمويل من صندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية والصندوق الأردني للريادة والبنك العربي؛ حيث جرى توقيع اتفاقية استثمار في صندوق الواحة الثاني بحضور رئيس مجلس أمناء صندوق الملك عبدالله الثاني للتنمية المهندس علاء البطاينة، ووزير الاقتصاد الرقمي والريادة مثنى الغرايبة، ورئيس مجلس إدارة الصندوق الأردني للريادة د. محمد الجعفري، ونائب المدير العام التنفيذي للبنك العربي الفاضلة رندة الصادق، ورئيس مجلس إدارة “أويسس500” مروان جمعة.</div><div><br></div><div>&nbsp;وأكدت “أويسس 500” التي استثمرت في 152 شركة ريادية تقنية وإبداعية من صندوقه الاستثماري الأول، أن الصندوق الاستثماري الثاني “صندوق الواحة الثاني” الذي جرى إطلاقه أمس يعد ربحيا يهدف إلى إحداث تأثير اجتماعي واقتصادي من خلال الاستثمار في رياديي الأعمال الكفؤين بمبلغ يصل إلى 100 ألف دولار، لتأسيس شركات في مجالات التكنولوجيا والصناعات الإبداعية.</div>

Oasis500 launches its second investment fund of 15 million dollars

“أويسس500 يطلق صندوقه الاستثماري الثاني لدعم الريادة بحجم 15 مليون دولار

<div>As hundreds of business and government leaders prepare to convene at the Dead Sea for the 10th World Economic Forum on the Middle East and Africa, host Jordan is confronting near-record unemployment and a debt crisis. To revive the kingdom’s sluggish economy and trigger growth, the nation is turning its efforts to start-ups.<br><br></div><div>Investment in the sector in the past few years is already apparent: 27 out of the 100 most promising Arab start-ups being highlighted at this weekend’s WEF conference are Jordanian.<br><br></div><div>Yet despite backing from royal institutions and telecom giants to create a start-up-friendly ecosystem in the kingdom, bureaucratic government regulations and keeping Jordan’s most promising start-ups from being lured abroad remain obstacles to the kingdom in cultivating the fruits of its start-up policies. Jordan’s focus on human capital to turn around the kingdom’s economic fortunes is natural. It is, officials here say, the country’s largest resource.</div><div>At Oasis500, a tech and creative industries incubator and business accelerator modelled off Silicon Valley backed by King Abdullah, dozens of entrepreneurs were given 10,000 Jordanian dinars (Dh51,790) in seed money and six months of mentorship to turn their idea into a sustainable and thriving business.</div>

World Economic Forum Mena 2019: Jordan becomes a start-up hub to boost economy

المنتدى الاقتصادي العالمي الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا  ٢٠١٩: الأردن يصبح مركزًا ناشئًا لدعم الاقتصاد.

<div>Two and a half years ago, we published a selection of 10 Accelerators in the Middle East and North Africa, most of which at the time were still very young. Since then, the regional ecosystem has turned into a vibrant scene that’s constantly trying out different models and iterating. Some accelerators shut down, like Seeqnce, Meydan and Cairo’s Plug and Play space, but many more have opened, some with great success, helping successful or promising startups take their operations to the next level.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>First off, let's make it clear what we're talking about. An accelerator is a competitive program that selects a few early-stage startups to join a class or batch in order to help them kick-start their product. Accelerator programs often offer seed investment in exchange for equity. By a given deadline, selected startups should be able to boost traction and raise funds. Because young entrepreneurs in the region may need more time and attention than in more mature ecosystems, some accelerators in the region may not match exactly the generally accepted definition of an accelerator. Here, we've selected the programs that match at least 2/3 of the criteria mentioned above. (We haven't forgotten incubators though, so stay tuned for an upcoming list of the incubators in the region.)<br><br></div><div>Here is a list of accelerators in the region ranked by date of launch:<br><br></div><div><figure data-trix-attachment="{&quot;contentType&quot;:&quot;image&quot;,&quot;height&quot;:87,&quot;url&quot;:&quot;http://wamda-prod.s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/content/df2070ae78b3473.jpeg&quot;,&quot;width&quot;:200}" data-trix-content-type="image" class="attachment attachment--preview"><img src="http://wamda-prod.s3-eu-west-1.amazonaws.com/content/df2070ae78b3473.jpeg" width="200" height="87"><figcaption class="attachment__caption"></figcaption></figure>Oasis500<br><br></div><div><strong>Based: </strong>Amman, Jordan<br><strong>Launched: </strong>September 2010 by a board of directors led by Usama Fayyad, previously Yahoo’s Chief Data Officer<br><br></div><div><strong>Model: </strong>Tech-oriented startups apply and complete a five-day intensive Boot Camp. Then, qualified startups proceed to receive 100 days of mentorship at Oasis500 (pictured above), and pitch to receive 22,000 JD (~ $31,000 USD) of seed investment for 5-20% equity (depending on the stage of the business). Startups that demonstrate growth qualify for a second round of investment from 50,000 JD (~ $70,000 USD) to 500,000 JD (~ $705,000 USD), another 100 days of incubation, and a chance to pitch to a global network of investors at Oasis500’s Angel Network event. Famous alumni include <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2013/10/aramex-google-paypal-and-shopgo-launch-e-commerce-solution-ezstore-me-to-help-offline-retailers-go-online">Shopgo</a>, <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2012/10/10-startups-in-the-arab-world-that-parents-will-love">Little Thinking Minds</a>, <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2014/06/feesheh-on-fire-online-music-shop-expands-into-the-uae">Feesheh</a>, <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2014/02/online-arabic-music-school-i3zif-kicks-off-the-year-with-3-ambitious-new-goals">i3zif</a>, and <a href="https://www.wamda.com/2012/10/jamalon-hits-9-million-books-can-it-crack-the-saudi-market">Jamalon</a>.</div>

14 regional accelerators that can put your startup in the fast lane.

١٤ مسرعة أعمال في المنطقة ستساعدك بإطلاق عملك بشكل سريع

<div>The walls of Oasis500’s Amman headquarters are lined with ancient, inspirational quotes. “Small obstacles seem insurmountable in the eyes of small thinkers,” reads one, by the tenth century Arab poet Al-Mutanabbi, “while grand challenges seem trivial in the eyes of the great.”<br><br></div><div>Just feet away, the small, glass-walled office of Saleem Najjar, a 31-year-old Damascene, is lined with more perfunctory language. Words such as “engagement”, “motivation” and “profitability”, scrawled on a whiteboard behind the stocky, bespectacled startup founder might not carry the same weight as Al-Mutanabbi’s. But few would suggest the triviality of his own situation.<br><br></div><div>Najjar is one of several Syrians working in Jordan, whose lives were turned upside down by their country’s amaranthine conflict, that rages just a few dozen miles from Amman, Jordan’s sweeping capital. He was just finding success when it began. In 2009 Damascus’ Old City was a busy warren of tight-knit streets, shops and restaurants. He saw an opportunity for a “kind of Yelp for Syria”, he tells me. Within two years Najjar had 200 restaurants on his site, Mataamy.com (“my restaurant” in Arabic). A local VC firm invested a small amount and the company even won a startup competition organised by oil giant Shell. Najjar had an office, and five employees. He wanted to scale.<br><br></div><div>Then war broke. Rebels and Islamists daubed the Old City’s walls with anti-government samizdat. Anyone walking around could be stopped and accused of writing it. That meant detention, torture – even death. Almost overnight, the entire neighbourhood emptied. Najjar decided to get out of Syria. “I thought it won’t be safe in the coming days, and this was just the start,” he says. “I felt it was going to be very, very bad.”<br><br>By then Najjar was already supporting his mother Nada, sister Sally and brother Sam – whose severe disability needed round-the-clock care. In 2012 he got a passport from the Syrian government and moved them all to Amman, a sandstone sprawl of four million people, almost half of Jordan’s entire population. Amman already had a reputation as a regional tech hub. It had accelerators, like Oasis500 and the <a href="http://www.qrce.org/">Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship</a>. Multinationals such as Microsoft, Oracle, Cisco and Samsung ran offices at the King Hussein Business Park, a huge, cubist complex on the city’s western limit. It even had major startup success stories: Yahoo!’s 2009 purchase of Maktoob for $164 million raised eyebrows worldwide.<br><br></div><div>Oasis500 in particular was on the lookout for Syrian entrepreneurs. In 2012 it graduated ShopGo, an e-commerce platform created by Syrian Moe Ghashim. Today, ShopGo employs dozens of people and has an office in Dubai. Buoyed by its own success <a href="http://oasis500.com/">Oasis500</a> now has 2,500 companies in its pipeline, and will launch a $20m fund in the first quarter of 2018. But for Najjar, things were tough. Amman was far more expensive than Damascus, and his savings ran dry. Jordanians were already replicating Mataamy’s model in the country. “I needed a quick plan,” he says. “A startup plan.”<br><br></div><div><strong>F</strong>our hundred thousand Syrians have been killed in their country’s civil war. Five million are displaced. Officially, 659,593 of them have travelled to Jordan, with which Syria shares a 229-mile border. Jordan’s government estimates the real figure to be around double that, at a cost of around $10 billion. Jordan is facing its own employment problems, and efforts to find work for its new Syrian inhabitants have been fraught. Oasis500, like a handful of NGOs, has realised that tech entrepreneurialism is an ideal way to create new jobs – and solve economic issues doing so.<br><br></div><div>Suleiman Arabiat, Oasis500’s operations manager, tells me he looks for talent wherever it is, including Syria. “The whole entrepreneurial DNA is the same all over the world. It’s about spotting a problem somewhere and solving it. Does the Syrian situation motivate that? Sure, but we know that it has demotivated others.” This March Jordan’s King Abdullah II, who has appeared in Star Trek: The Next Generation, and accelerated economic reforms to accommodate tech, hailed innovative entrepreneurs as “future avenues for prosperity”. ICT now represents around 12 per cent of Jordan’s GDP.<br><br></div><div>But unemployment is still a big worry for the country. It currently hovers just below 18 per cent. For men the figure is 13.9 per cent, while almost a third of the kingdom’s women are without work. Its statistics department attributes the alarming lack of roles for women to an increase in informal work, and the influx of refugees. Oasis500 is one of the organisations trying to change that. Of the 185 entrepreneurs it has invested in since 2011, 23 have been women. It’s a small, but growing number. Its creative industries fund, which endows journalists, designers, musicians and other artists, has awarded funds to four women from ten successful applicants. Of Oasis500’s dozen key team members, seven are women. “These numbers can only show that female founders in Jordan and the MENA region are proving themselves as equally capable as male founders,” says Oasis500 marketing chief Nora Al Moghrabi.<br><br></div><div>Lara Shahin is one example. When the war started Damascus-born Shahin, 35, began helping those fleeing violence in other provinces, alongside some friends, with food and money. But soon government forces began taking notice. When in 2012 two of Shahin’s collaborators were kidnapped and beaten, she knew she had to escape. When she arrived in Amman, Shahin, who is affable and holds her cigarettes upright like a French film star, decided she would continue to help those affected by the war. She has two brothers who were stopped from entering Jordan. They now live in Munich, Germany: her mother and father “cry every day,” she says.<br><br></div><div>Having visited refugees’ homes Shahin would see the women crafting household goods: soap, crochet, table decorations. “When I see that I think, ‘Why don’t we help these families to make products?’. I help them sell the products so they work and don’t need any help,” she tells me. Shahin began work in 2013 with five women in a 40-square-metre office, training and selling Syrian handicrafts (Syria’s textile industry employed 30 per cent of the country’s workforce before the outbreak of war). Some women were widows. Others could not bring their husbands due to Jordan’s immigration rules. Others’ husbands were still fighting.<br><br></div><div>Within a year Shahin had over a hundred women on the books. She called the firm Jasmine. But it faced two major problems: how to reach customers online, and – more importantly – how to register her company in Jordan as a Syrian. For the first, she turned to Najjar, who by then had founded his second startup.<br><br></div><div>Spend enough time speaking to Syrians in Amman and you will hear the same phrase over and over: work permit. While Jordan has taken in a huge number of migrants from its northern neighbour, and provided shelter and education in cities and locations like the huge, 80,000-populated Zaatari Refugee Camp, putting them to work has proved harder. In February 2016 Jordan, with backing from the EU, launched the Jordan Compact: a drive to provide 200,000 work permits for Syrians. By March 2017, only 35,000 had been handed out.<br><br></div><div>In August this year authorities eased restrictions on permits in the construction industry. But for startup founders, who are not employees, asking authorities for a work permit is often Kafka-esque, and unsuccessful. There are two routes: either pay 50,000 Jordanian dinars (£53,586) and partner with a local, or pay 200,000JOD (£214,344) to be classified as an investor.<br><br></div><div>The rules stem partly from an earlier influx of Syrians, who fled their homes in 1982 when Hafez Al Assad, the father and predecessor to current president Bashar, massacred residents of the town of Hama to put an end to six years of Islamist uprisings. Jordanians complained their new neighbours undercut wages and took work away from locals. For Shahin, the rule was disastrous. Her Jordanian partner stole stock, money – “my company”. Police told her there was no recourse to justice. “It was very bad but it’s a lesson for me,” she says. Shahin closed her doors, and registered Jasmine as an NGO with a Jordanian name.<br><br></div><div>Najjar has also had problems with his work permit. By last August he had pitched his latest concept, Sharqi.shop, “a customisable Etsy for the region,” to Oasis500. In September Sharqi was green-lit. But Oasis500 only gives funding to companies that are already registered. By the end of 2016 Najjar found the 50,000JOD required to register Sharqi alongside a local. But it was almost everything he had. The next four to five months were “very tough,” he says. At one point he only had 100JOD (£107) in his bank account.<br><br></div><div>Work permits are one of three issues that Oasis500 is lobbying Jordan’s government to change. It wants the country to follow Ireland’s lead of relaxing rules, that has brought it thousands of jobs from tech heavyweights like Facebook and Google. Another problem is that startups must work from a “closed space” to be registered, disqualifying those who have co-working desks. The third issue is opening up greater diplomatic channels regarding the tech industry. In this, Oasis500 has found success: Jordan now has an investment minister in its cabinet.<br><br></div><div>For now, however, Syrians working in Jordan’s tech scene must face additional hurdles in their paths to success. Syrian driver’s licences are not accepted as ID by Jordanian authorities, for example. And travel outside the country can take up to two months for approval. Shahin now runs her NGO from a small, cramped office above a bank on one of Amman’s busiest streets. With help from Sharqi, she now sells items online and on social media – and helps thousands of women make a living in Amman.<br><br></div><div>“I love Amman,” she says. “Because it’s very near to Damascus, and additionally in way of life. I feel the same weather. I love people here. I can help Syrian refugees more here than in other countries.” She still has problems with bureaucracy, she adds. But things are improving. If the war in Syria ends, she wants to move back in a year. Najjar would return too. He likes Amman, and Jordanians – “I want to be part of them,” he says – but he doesn’t feel the same excitement in Amman as in Damascus, which is the world’s oldest continually inhabited capital city. “You feel there is…a soul in Damascus. I would like to go back and work there. But in terms of business and scaling it, Amman is much better.”<br><br></div><div>There are many more obstacles to overcome. But Najjar is confident he can rise to the grand challenges described by Al-Mutanabbi beside his desk. Hopefully for he and his compatriots, Jordan can overcome its shortfalls and capitalise on its newfound tech talent.</div>

Syrian entrepreneurs are fighting for a second chance in Amman

فرصة للبدء من جديد لرواد الأعمال السوريين في عمان

<div>For the last half-century the politics of the Middle East has been shaped by five key pillars, but all five are now crumbling. A new Middle East is aborning — but not necessarily the flourishing one that people imagined in the 1990s.<br><br></div><div>This one is being shaped more by Twitter memes than by U.S. diplomats, more by unemployment than by terrorism, more by upheavals on the streets than by leaders in palaces, more by women than by men. Can’t say where it will all settle out, but for now, beware falling pillars.</div><div>Jordan’s King Abdullah recently told a group of U.S. military visitors that what keeps him up at night is just one thing — and it’s not ISIS or Al Qaeda. It’s the fact that 300,000 Jordanians are unemployed and 87 percent of them are between the ages of 18 and 39, prime working years.<br><br></div><div>For weeks there have been sit-ins by jobless students outside Abdullah’s palace and protest marches across Jordan by the unemployed, hungry and hopeless. At the same time, the unemployed in Gaza last week began a “revolt of the hungry” against Hamas’s economic mismanagement, and similar street protests erupted in Algeria and Sudan, aimed at their failing, long-entrenched autocrats. Arab Spring 2.0 anyone?</div>

Changes beyond the control of the region’s leaders are spurring a new Middle East.

تغييرات خارجة عن سيطرة قادة المنطقة تحفز نشوء شرق أوسط جديد.

<div>Amman-based seed investor and accelerator Oasis500 has appointed Luma Fawaz as its new Chief Executive Officer, the firm announced today. Luma is replacing Faisal Hakki, the outgoing CEO who was with Oasis500 since June 2016.She comes with more than 15 years of experience in different investment and financial analysis roles and was Head of Investments with Oasis500 since August 2015.</div>

Jordan’s Oasis500 appoints Luma Fawaz as new CEO

تعيين لمى فواز مديراً تنفيذياً جديداً في Oasis500

<div>His Majesty King Abdullah has given the information and communication technology (ICT) sector great care and focus over the past 20 years to help companies and workers grow and develop, Int@j CEO Nidal Bitar said. Bitar highlighted King Abdullah’s support to the sector in a recent e-mail sent to The Jordan Times.<br><br></div><div>Since His Majesty’s Accession to the Throne, the ICT sector has been granted incentives and exemptions, including a 15 per cent reduction in income tax, and a zero per cent sales tax on exports, according to Bitar.<br><br></div><div>The ICT sector’s revenue has jumped from JD210 million in 2003, to more than JD480 million in 2017, Bitar said, adding that the sector’s exports also increased in value from JD48 million, to more than JD189 million during the same period. The number of ICT employees and workers also rose from 8,117 in 2003, to 17,672 in 2017.<br><br></div><div>Int@j’s CEO stressed that King Abdullah’s efforts to increase the number of business incubators and accelerators in the Kingdom also led to Jordan’s rise on the Global Entrepreneurship Index. Jordan now ranks 49th on the index and contains more than 25 business incubators, accelerators and creative centres.</div>

ICT sector’s growth reflection of policies over past 20 years.

نمو قطاع الصناعات التكنولوجية على مدى العشرين سنة الماضية

<div>Since its establishment in 2010, Oasis500 has funded and supported over 150 startup companies across the Kingdom, with around 680 direct and 4,400 indirect jobs introduced to the market, Assistant Marketing Manager Fahed Qteishat said on Wednesday.</div><div>An investment company that aims to develop and adopt business ideas in real projects, Oasis500 searches for entrepreneurs with business models, which they help kick off their startup through investing and linking them to future sources of funding.</div><div>The startups that secure funding are then moved to Oasis500’s facilities for 180 days to develop their idea.&nbsp;<br><br></div><div>&nbsp;“Any startup, whether already established or not, needs fundraising in order to reach its business objectives, so fundraising [and] funding procedures are quite important for startups. Investment companies usually seek to invest in sustainability,” Qteishat told The Jordan Times, noting that, when the required components come together, “true potential is created to ensure the growth of the startup, especially in terms of scaling and expansion”.</div>

Startup scene in Jordan is definitely booming

إزدهار قطاع الشركات الناشئة في الأردن بشكل ملحوظ

<div>Amman-based accelerator and seed investor Oasis500 has announced partial exit from Jordanian edtech startup Little Thinking Minds. The announcement was made last week.</div><div>Founded in 2004 by Rama Kayyali and Lamia Tabbaa who were joined by the third co-founder Salwa Katkhuda afterwards, Little Thinking Minds originally used to create educational content in form of videos and other things for children, before transforming recently into an educational technologies and products provider, that creates digital solutions and platforms with the aim of improving learning outcomes for school aged children in Middle East &amp; North Africa and beyond.</div><div>The startup had raised <a href="https://www.menabytes.com/little-thinking-minds-series-a/"><strong>$1.265 million Series A</strong></a> in December last year at a valuation of [redacted]. According to the publicly available data, Oasis 500 was the first investor in Little Thinking Minds – having invested $230,000 in 2011.</div>

Oasis500 announces partial exit from Jordanian edtech startup Little Thinking Minds

إعلان التخارج الجزئي من شركة المفكرون الصغار

<div>Welcome to our <a href="https://clt1575817.bmeurl.co/10E1E0B7"><strong>March 2024 newsletter</strong></a>, where we're excited to share the latest updates from within our portfolio companies. This month, we're thrilled to highlight the achievements and milestones of our portfolio companies, as well as provide insights into our internal scoops and activities, We're continuously inspired by the dedication and creativity of our community members.&nbsp;<br>Stay up to date with our monthly newsletter!&nbsp;</div>

<div>مرحبًا بكم في<a href="https://clt1575817.bmeurl.co/10E1E0B7"><strong> النشرة الإخبارية لشهر آذار 2024</strong></a>، نحن متحمسون لمشاركة أحدث التحديثات من داخل شركاتنا لهذا الشهر، فخورين بتسليط الضوء على إنجازات الشركات، بالإضافة إلى تقديم نظرة عميقة على والأنشطة لدينا. نحن مستمرون في&nbsp; تلقي الإلهام من خلال التفاني والإبداع لأعضاء مجتمعنا.&nbsp;<br>!كن على اطلاع دائم مع نشرتنا الشهرية</div>

Oasis500 Newsletter - March 2024 🚀

Oasis500 Newsletter - March 2024

النشرة الإخبارية الخاصة بأويسس500 - آذار 2024

Batch of 2023

Yaseer is a pioneering B2B Fast-Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) wholesale marketplace that is set to disrupt the current landscape of business-to-business transactions in the FMCG sector. With a dynamic and innovative approach, Yaseer is redefining the way wholesalers and suppliers interact, creating efficiencies and opportunities that were previously untapped.

يسير هو  وسيط رائد في مجال تكنولوجيا الجملة للسلع الاستهلاكية السريعة الحركة (FMCG) بين الشركات (B2B)، والذي يهدف إلى تعديل الوضع الحالي لعمليات التجارة بين الشركات في قطاع السلع الاستهلاكية السريعة الحركة (FMCG). بفضل نهجه الدينامكي والمبتكر، يقوم يسير بإعادة تشكيل طريقة تفاعل تجار الجملة والموردين، مما يسفر عن تحقيق فرص كانت غير مستغلة في السابق وبشكل فعال.

FMCGTech

Tarek Yaghmour

YASEER

Numa is creating a professional banking* platform tailored to the needs of the 40+ million underbanked freelancers, creators, and self-employed professionals in the Arab world. Their product is a mobile app that offers a suite of banking solutions, including checking accounts, virtual and physical cards, and an integrated invoicing CRM. Their goal is to bridge the gap between traditional banking and the growing freelance economy in the MENA region. *Numa is a financial technology company, not a bank. Banking services are provided by their banking partners.

تقوم نومى ببناء حلول مصرفية وائتمانية لأكثر من 40 مليون عامل مستقل يعمل لحسابهم الخاص، ومنشئي المحتوى، والمهنيين العاملين لحسابهم الخاص في العالم العربي. إذ سيقومون بتمكينهم من خلال الخدمات المالية المصممة لاحتياجاتهم، بما في ذلك بطاقات الخصم وبطاقات الائتمان وتمويل الفواتير وغير ذلك الكثير، يتم كل ذلك من تطبيق جوال واحد.

FinTech

Loay Malahmeh

Issam Najm

NUMA

Batch of 2022

CoinMENA is the fastest growing exchange for retail and institutional clients to buy and sell digital assets in MENA. Headquartered in the Kingdom of Bahrain, CoinMENA is a Sharia-compliant digital assets exchange that is licensed and regulated by the Central Bank of Bahrain (CBB). Through CoinMENA, you can buy, sell, store, and receive digital assets safely and securely, as well as deposit and withdraw in your local currency.

كوين مينا هي المنصة الأسهل، الأكثر أماناً والأسرع لشراء وبيع العملات الرقمية  يقع المقر الرئيسي لـكوين مينا في مملكة البحرين ، وهي عبارة عن بورصة أصول رقمية متوافقة مع الشريعة الإسلامية ومرخصة ومنظمة من قبل مصرف البحرين المركزي (CBB). من خلال كوين مينا، يمكنك شراء الأصول الرقمية وبيعها وتخزينها واستلامها بأمان وأمان ، بالإضافة إلى الإيداع والسحب بعملتك المحلية.

Talal Tabbaa

COINMENA

The SimSim Recipes app has everything you need to plan and prepare meals and feasts for family and friends. SimSim's vision is to be a leading global Middle Eastern food brand that provides a comprehensive and seamless online and offline solution for consumers' home-cooking needs through content (recipes) and ecommerce (ingredients, frozen and ready to eat foods), while connecting with them through culture, social responsibility, and purpose.

"  تتلخص رؤية سِمسِم في أن يصبح أحد تطبيقات الأكل العربي الرائدة في العالم من خلال تقديم حلول متكاملة وسهلة عبر القنوات الإلكترونية وغير الإلكترونية لتغطية احتياجات المستهلكين في الطبخ عبر المحتوى (الوصفات) والتجارة الإلكترونية (المكونات، الأكلات الجاهزة والمجمّدة)، وفي نفس الوقت التواصل معهم من خلال الثقافات، والمسؤولية الاجتماعية والغايات.

FoodTech

Farida Shakhshir

SIMSIM

Positioning themselves at the intersection between Health & Fitness, and EdTech; JUMP Academy is a fitness academy that is infiltrating a market where there is a clear absence of specialization, proper qualifications, professional Arabic material, e-Learning tools, and platforms.

تموضع هذه الأكاديمية نفسها على نقطة تقاطع بين الصحة واللياقة البدنية والتكنولوجيا التعليمية. أكاديمية  جمب هي أكاديمية للياقة البدنية تخترق سوقًا يعاني من غياب واضح للتخصص والمؤهلات المناسبة والمواد الاحترافية العربية ومنصات وأدوات التعلم الإلكتروني.

EdTech

Fatin Tuffaha

JUMP ACADEMY

Nestrom is a B2B Software as a Service that targets QHSE departments in enterprise companies with a SaaS solution to orchestrate their operations and ensure compliance with standard procedures avoiding unwanted losses and financial losses.

نسترُم هي شركة تقدم البرمجيات كخدمة للمؤسسات، مستهدفة على الأخص أقسام الجودة والصحة والسلامة البيئية فيها بحلهم البرمجي كخدمة لتنسيق عملياتهم وضمان الالتزام بإجراءات موحّدة متجنبين الخسائر المادية وغير المرغوبة.

Yousef Wadi

Kanaan Manasrah

Zaid Abdelhadi

NESTROM

Capitalizing on the current trend of cloud and virtual kitchens, Kitchefy essentially disrupts the F&B industry by turning commercial kitchens into cloud kitchens by injecting high-demand virtual brands into existing underutilized commercial kitchens.

مُستغلةً التوجه الحالي الواضح نحو المطابخ الافتراضية والسحابية، تقدم كيتشيفاي حلًا يغير من جوهر صناعة المأكولات والمشروبات بشكله الحالي، من خلال تحويل المطابخ الافتراضية إلى مطابخ سحابية، وذلك عن طريق إدراج علامات تجارية افتراضية متزايدة الطلب في مطابخ تجارية قائمة وغير مُستَغلة بشكل كامل.

Marwan Abu Sakha

Abdullah Alabsi

KITCHEFY

Batch of 2021

DR.GT is a smart artificial intelligence (“AI”)-driven car diagnostics and predictive maintenance solution that translates technical malfunctions in a vehicle into a user- friendly language and predicts errors before breakdowns.

شركة متخصصة في أنظمة الذكاء الاصطناعي الخاص بتشخيص مشاكل المركبات والتنبؤ بها قبل وقوعها بالإضافة إلى الإبلاغ عنها بلغة مبسطة، من خلال الاعتماد على تقنيات انترنت الأشياء وتحليل البيانات الضخمة.

AutoTech

Samia Sharawi

Ibrahim Ibrejeat

DR.GT

Algebra Intelligence is riding the wave of alternative, sustainable, and optimal energy solutions that the MENA region is experiencing. Algebra Intelligence’s management solution (TaQTak) is an innovative AI-driven energy management solution that improves the electricity system by providing real-time monitoring, proactive notifications, ticketing, and reporting solutions for companies.

تقوم ألجيبرا إنتيليجنس بمواكبة ما تختبره منطقة الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا في مجال حلول الطاقة البديلة والمستدامة والمثلى. تقدم ألجيبرا إنتيليجنس (طاقتك) حلا مبتكرا لإدارة الطاقة يحركه الذكاء الاصطناعي ويعمل على تحسين نظام الكهرباء عن طريق توفير ميزة للمراقبة تعتمد على البيانات الآنيّة والإشعار ات الاستباقية وحلول تذاكر الصيانة والتقارير للشركات.

EnergyTech

Ahmad Tawafsheh

ALGEBRA INTELLIGENCE

Khibraty is a leading digital expertise marketplace that ensures successful matchmaking of the right professional consultants & advisors with those seeking their support, in an efficient manner.

خبرتي هي منصة رائده قي مجال الوساطة الرقمية بين أصحاب الخبرة من الاستشاريين والاختصاصيين؛ وأولئك الباحثين عن خدماتهم بشكل دقيق وناجح.

Marketplace

Abeer Qumsieh

Caroline Ayoub

Iyad Kallas

KHIBRATY

Nowadays, more kids want to be YouTubers than astronauts and with the second largest global youth population, now is primetime for Arab content creators. Bith is an inclusive platform that offers gamers easy-to-use video editing tools and social media distribution tools to ease the content creation development cycle.

يفوق اليوم عدد اليافعين الذين يرغبون في أن يصبحوا صانعي محتوى على اليوتيوب عن الذين يرغبون في أن يصبحوا رواد فضاء. وكوننا في المرتبة الثانية عالميًا من حيث تعداد الشباب، يُعتبر الآن الوقت الأمثل لصانعي المحتوى العرب. بث هي منصة شمولية توفر لهواة الألعاب أدوات سهلة الاستخدام لتحرير الفيديوهات ونشرها في وسائل التواصل الاجتماعي مما يُسهّل الدورة التطويرية لصنع المحتوى.

Media & Entertainment

Omar Dweik

Daoud Al Rihani

BITH.TV

Empowering parents is empowering children. By 2050, over 270 million adolescents and youth will live in the MENA region, 67 million of whom will be born with a developmental disability of some sort. Habaybna, an Arabic digital platform and community, specializes in intellectual and developmental disabilities, offering services that can be tailored to different needs.

إن تمكين الوالدين هو تمكين للأطفال. مع حلول عام 2050، سيكون هناك أكثر من 270 مليون شاب ويافع يعيشون في منطقة الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا، منهم 67 مليونًا سيولدون مع إعاقة تطورية من نوع ما. تتخصص حبايبنا بالإعاقات التطورية والذهنية عبر منصتها المقدمة باللغة العربية وتقدم محتوى وخدمات ذات صلة يمكن تصميمها وفقًا للاحتياجات المختلفة، بالإضافة إلى مجتمع رقمي يتبادل فيه ذوي العلاقة الخبرات والنصائح.

Wellness

Reem AlFranji

Mohammed Alfranji

HABAYBNA

eJAD is the go-to place for on-demand quality maintenance services. It provides a comprehensive solution that connects all stakeholders: Maintenance service providers, commercial/individual customers and enabling Manufacturers, Distributors, Spare parts suppliers, all within a structured framework.

شركة متخصصة في تقديم خدمات الصيانة المتخصصة وتسويق المنتجات ذات العلاقة. تقدم الشركة خدماتها من خلال منصة تجمع كافة أصحاب المصلحة العاملين في القطاع المهني؛ من مزودي خدمات وموردين ومقاولين وعملاء من أصحاب المنازل والمنشآت.

Mohammad Ghazal

EJAD

Wallzy supports artists by providing them the space to display their work while also offering art lovers a one stop shop to print and frame their favorite wall art.

يدعم والزي الفنانين المحليين من خلال توفير منصة يستطيعون من خلالها عرض أعمالهم الفنية. ويوفر ايضا الفرصة لمحبي الفن شراء لوحاتهم المفضلة.

Zaid Daoud

Fares Haddadin

WALLZY

The increased momentum around AgriTech initiatives means modern farming’s reliance on it cannot be understated. Ivvest combines technology and science to offer a cost efficient, scalable solution to operating indoor farming pods producing fresh, healthy, safe, and clean products.

لا يمكن التقليل من شأن مدى اعتمادية الزراعة الحديثة على التكنولوجيا الزراعية خصوصًا مع الازدهار العظيم للمبادرات المتعلقة بها والذي نشهده حاليًا. تقوم إيڤيست بالجمع بين التكنولوجيا والعلم لتقدم حلًا مجديًا وقابلًا للتوسع، لتشغيل حجيرات الزراعة الداخلية وإنتاج منتجات طازجة وصحية وآمنة ونظيفة.

AgriTech

Abdel Rahman Alzubaidi

IVVEST

As students and their parents are navigating their reimagined digital educational paths, Alefredo Books offers a convenient, relevant, and cost-effective solution to access digital learning resources, interactive learning tools, and second-hand books for students.

بينما لا يزال التلاميذ وآباؤهم يقومون باستكشاف خياراتهم التعليمية المعاد تخيلها رقميًا، يقدم لهم ألفريدو بوكس حلاً ملائمًا وموفرًا للكلفة، إذ يتيح للطلاب الوصول إلى العديد من المصادر التعليمية الرقمية وأدوات التعلم التفاعلي والكتب الدراسية المستعملة.

Ahmad Al Saif

ALEFREDO BOOKS

E-commerce startup manufacturing its own footwear brand and selling across the Middle East, offering an affordable luxury range of shoes in both timeless and modern styles that are ideal for young professionals and millennials. Each pair of shoes is carefully handcrafted in Italy and Portugal, fusing comfort and style that can fit any occasion.

شركة ناشئة متخصصة بتصميم و صناعة الأحذيه الرجاليه بجودة عالية تحت اسم العلامة التجارية منجلوريا ، حيث يتم التصنيع يدويا بالبرتغال وإيطاليا. تتوفر منتجاتهم للشراء مباشرة عن طريق موقعهم الإلكتروني بالإضافة إلى التواجد بمتاجر عالمية بمنطقة الشرق الأوسط.

Apparel

Baha Qasem

MENGLORIA

Kabaten is a SportsTech platform. Imagine a world where the football industry is revolutionized by a single, comprehensive solution. With the power of digital transformation, you can automate competitions, supercharge fan engagement, collect in-depth stats, track live game scores, and leverage data analytics.

كباتن هي منصة تكنولوجية رياضية تم تطويرها من خلال حل واحد شامل. بفضل قوة التحول الرقمي، يمكنك أتمتة المسابقات وزيادة تفاعل المعجبين وجمع الإحصائيات المتعمقة، وتتبع نتائج المباريات الحية والاستفادة من تحليلات البيانات.

SportsTech

Omar Hadid

Stephanie Al Naber

KABATEN

As SaaS multiples dropped by 50% in 2022, alternative financing is increasingly lucrative for SaaS companies. Capifly strives to become the alternative financing provider for high-growth tech startups in the MENA region. Using Shari’ah-compliant, non-dilutive capital, Capifly is paving the way for aspiring SaaS startups by amplifying their growth and converting their ARR into instant cash.

نظرًا لانخفاض مضاعفات سوق الشركات التي تقدم البرمجيات كخدمة بنسبة ٥۰% في ۲۰۲۲، بات التمويل البديل مربحًا بشكل متزايد لهذه الشركات. تسعى كاپيفلاي لتصبح مصدرًا للتمويل البديل للشركات التكنولوجية الناشئة وسريعة النمو في الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا. وباستخدام رأس مال متوافق مع الشريعة الإسلامية لا يقلل رأس مال الشركات، تمكّن كابيفلاي الشركات الناشئة التي تقدم البرمجيات كخدمة من مضاعفة نموها وتحويل إيراداتها إلى نقد فوري.

Dunya Bashiti

CAPIFLY

Starting out as an offline family business and venturing out to become a regional marketplace of locally produced products is the job of Dibeen Farms. Dibeen. com is a bridge connecting - and therefore empowering - local farmers and producers with the world.

تمكنت مزارع دبين من الإقدام على مغامرة تحويل عمل العائلة من شكله الحسي التقليدي إلى منصة على الإنترنت إلى أن اصبح دبين.كوم سوقا إقليميًا للمنتجات المصنّعة محليًا حيث يعمل موقع كجسر يربط المزارعين والمنتجين المحليين بالعالم مما يعمل على تمكينهم في هذا المجال.

Zeid Koudsi

DIBEEN

Batch of 2020

Fitely is your high-tech health and fitness digital companion that provides you with everything you need for a health and fitness lifestyle in a hassle-free manner under your fingertips.

هو رفيقك الرقمي للصحة واللياقة البدنية عالي التقنية الذي يوفر لك كل ما تحتاجه لنمط حياة صحي ولياقة بطريقة خالية من المتاعب تحت أناملك.

Siwar Alkhalid

Abedlhaleem Shahin

Fitely

Flashlights are currently segmented in the market into a variety of product types with most having strength in one given feature. JORDILIGHT offers a multi-feature product that is adaptable and versatile, a smart, portable, wearable flashlight with a mobile application.

تتفرق المصابيح اليدوية الموجودة في السوق حاليًا بين تشكيلة مختلفة من منتجات متنوعة حسب الاستخدام، والتي يمتلك معظمها نقطة قوة في ميزة واحدة فقط. تقدم جوردي لايت منتجًا متعدد الميزات ومتنوع الاستخدامات وقابلًا للتكيف. إنه مصباح كاشف ذكي ومحمول وقابل للارتداء ويأتي مع تطبيق للهاتف النقال.

Hardware

Robert Haddad

JORDILIGHT

Stuttering is a common challenge for more than 70 million people globally. TakalamTech offers a real-time solution that reduces stuttering with proven efficiency of up to 95% through a hidden wearable and digital therapy platform, using AI for dynamic configuration that does not exist in competitor devices, making it the first mover in MENA.

يعد التلعثم تحديًا شائعًا وعلى نطاق واسع لأكثر من 70 مليون إنسان في العالم. تقدم لهم تكلّم التقنية حلًا آنيًا يقلل من التلعثم بكفاءة مثبتة تصل إلى 95% عن طريق ارتداء سماعة مخفية ومنصة للعلاج الرقمي مستخدمًا الذكاء الصناعي لموائمة إعداداته وهو ما يفتقر إليه المنافسون مما يجعل تلك الشركة الناشئة المحرك الأول في منطقة الشرق الأوسط وشمال أفريقيا.