• Egypt-based social commerce platform Brimore has raised a $25 million Series A round, led by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Endure Capital, with participation from Fawry, Flourish, Endeavor Catalyst Fund and the startup's existing investors including Algebra Ventures, Disruptech, Khawarizmi Ventures and Vision Ventures. This marks the IFC's first-ever direct investment into an Egyptian startup.
• Founded in 2017 by Mohamed Abdulaziz, Ahmed Sheikha, and Mahmoud Refaay, Brimore enables small businesses to get their product out to the mass market by connecting them with to wide network of distributors across Egypt.
• The company plans to deploy the funding to expand its product offerings, grow network suppliers and accelerate its expansion across Africa.

Press release

Brimore, Egypt’s largest social commerce platform, has closed its Series A round of $25M, led by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and Endure Capital with participation from Fawry, Flourish, Endeavor Catalyst Fund and existing Brimore investors including Algebra Ventures, Disruptech, Khawarizmi Ventures and Vision Ventures. The fresh funds will be used to grow its products and suppliers and expand across the continent to become the leading social commerce app of Africa.

Three years into its foundation, Brimore was able to grow 400x, build a massive network of almost 75,000 resellers to cover 27 cities within Egypt, with a focus on rural and remote areas. Brimore uses its unique infrastructure and proprietary technology to avail market penetration opportunities to emerging brands owners. Brimore enables its sellers, who are mostly women, to unlock an alternative and flexible income method and become local business leaders through their custom solutions of online and offline sales channels.

The new capital will fuel Brimore’s growth within the next year, growing its network of sellers and suppliers 4x, doubling the number of its employees and increasing the number of products sold three-fold. By 2023, Brimore aims to operate in three countries and strengthen its physical logistics capabilities.

“In the past three years, we’ve focused on building a smart and reliable infrastructure that enables the masses to do their commerce businesses, wherever they are, and whatever they have,” said Mohamed Abdulaziz, Brimore’s CEO and Co-Founder. “We’ll be using the fresh fund to scale our infrastructure, enabling many more people to continue their journey of 50x growth by 2023, and opening this gate of hope and opportunity to other people in African markets.

Ahmed Sheikha, Chief Business and Investment Officer and Co-Founder at Brimore added: “Our ambition is to create a global model where market access is democratized through the power of people. Our promise is that we will use technology, operations and creative financing models to make it true.” Brimore isn't only about online reselling, it commoditizes trust, allowing brands to reach all types of audiences, and helps resellers sell online and offline, especially in areas with minimal internet penetration.

Walid Labadi, IFC’s country manager for Egypt, said: “IFC is excited to support Brimore as a leader in social commerce in Egypt. This is our largest direct investment in social commerce so far,” said Walid Labadi, IFC’s country manager for Egypt. “IFC’s co-lead investment in Brimore aims to help the platform continue to democratize access to e-commerce, increase economic opportunities for women, and support the development of the local manufacturing sector in the country.”

Tarek Fahim, Managing Partner at Endure Capital, said: “Every decade, comes a company that fuses technology, operations excellence, and human capital to unlock unprecedented impact and value. We are proud to be Brimore's first and continuous partner in their mission of building the infrastructure and technology for social commerce in Egypt and Africa, to change the lives of their partners, especially women who aspire for a better future for themselves and their families.”

Tarek Assaad, Managing Partner at Algebra Ventures said: “As Brimore experienced explosive growth over the past three years, Algebra has worked closely with the company to support in strategic and operational areas, especially recruitment, which is a key area of focus at Algebra. We came in on the first round of investment and invested in every subsequent round, to ensure that the growth momentum stays on track. We are delighted to see such a strong group of investors, many of whom have co-invested with us in the past, coming into the company. I am humbled by how Mohamed and Ahmed have grown as leaders and continue to drive the execution and vision of the company forward.”

• Egypt-based VC firm A15 has invested in fintech startup Sympl. The amount invested was not disclosed.
• Founded in October 2021 by Yasmine Henna, Mohamed El-Feky and Karim Tawfik, Sympl is a buy now pay later service, allowing merchants to sell products and services directly to customers on short-term and interest-free repayment plans.
• A15 is an early-stage venture capital firm with a focus on innovative tech startups. It has over 25 portfolio companies operating in 20 markets in verticals like fintech, e-commerce, SaaS and adtech.

Press release:

A15, a leading venture capital firm supporting entrepreneurs in the Mena region, has announced it is the first investor in one of Egypt’s latest startups to successfully launch, Sympl – which is set to disrupt the country’s consumer payments sector.

Focused on tech startups and with a long track record in generating value for fintech, A15 is a key partner both in capital investment but also knowledge and experience.

A15 invests in its portfolio companies at an early stage, working closely with the founders to generate value across different channels.

As well as providing an invaluable support network for founders, A15 also supports startups operationally, through product development or technology integrations, and preparing for future funding rounds and exit strategies.

A15’s partnership with Sympl - whose co-founders' experience includes co-creating leading consumer finance company ValU and B2B commerce platform Capiter – ideally positions both companies. With A15’s early investment in the startup, the venture capital firm was able to support the development of the Sympl checkout platform and successfully help to bring it to launch. Together, both companies will continue to drive innovation in Egypt’s payments sector and contribute to Egypt’s ongoing commitment to a transition to a cashless society.

Karim Beshara, General Partner at A15, commented:

“At A15, we are committed to partnering with strong founding teams in the very early stages of their ventures, where we can work closely together to unlock value. We pride ourselves on the close relationships we maintain with the founders and their teams, supporting them from the beginning as part of the A15 family. We are excited to have backed Sympl from day one and are proud of the early positive signs from their launch. We look forward to continued close collaboration and scaling the business.”

Mohamed Elfeky, Chief Executive Officer of Sympl, said:

“A15 has been a crucial partner in the early stages of our growth. Their support in product development initiatives, tech integrations and connections to their startups’ ecosystem have been important in our early success. We look forward to continuing our partnership with them to drive innovation, provide new solutions for merchants and consumers, and contribute to the transition to a cashless society in Egypt.”

With over 30 investments in the Mena region to date, A15 is a leading promoter of entrepreneurship and innovation.

In September 2018, A15 announced it had successfully sold a 76 per cent stake in its fintech portfolio company, TPAY, to leading African private equity firm Helios Investment Partners, making it the first fund to create a ‘Dragon’ - an exit that returns the value of the entire fund through the realised proceeds from a single investment - in the MENA region.

With the support of A15, Sympl’s “Save your money pay later” checkout platform successfully launched in October via an exclusive partnership with leading Apple reseller, Tradeline - on the release of the new iPhone 13. Other partnerships have been established with key retailers in the electronics and appliances sector (2B), jewellery (Al-Mawardy Jewelry, Damas, and Jawhara), auto parts (Your Parts), hypermarket (Hyperone) sectors, and covering merchants in an array of other categories such as furniture, fashion, travel and medical services. Since the launch, Sympl has reported a lot of traction from customers using Sympl technology on the platforms of existing merchants, as well as a long pipeline of merchants who want to partner to embed Sympl to enhance their customer checkout experience.

source: Wamda