Mubasher TV
Contact Us Advertising   العربية

Egypt Ventures leads $1m funding round for life science startup Nawah

Egypt Ventures leads $1m funding round for life science startup Nawah
Egypt Ventures secured EGP 103.8 million in direct and indirect investments during 2020

Cairo – Mubasher: Egypt Ventures led a financing round for the emerging company, Nawah, the first private Egyptian multidisciplinary research centre for natural and medical sciences, with a value of $1 million, the Chairman and Managing Director, Ahmed Gomaa.

This is in line with Egypt Ventures to support and promote entrepreneurship in tech companies and technology-backed companies at the local and regional level, according to a statement by the Ministry of International Cooperation on Thursday.

Gomaa added that they were one of the first institutions supporting Nawah in enabling its scientific research in the Middle East and Africa. The new financing round will enable the company to expand its business and enter new markets.

He added that the new financing round raised the capital of Nawah to $2 million, led by Egypt Ventures. This also succeeded in attracting private sector investors, namely, Alexandria Fund, Cairo Angels, Alex Angels, Hult Alumni Angels, and a number of international investors.

Founder and CEO of Nawah, Omar Sakr, explained that his company has, since 2015, contributed to empowering the scientific community in Egypt, helping researchers and pharmaceutical companies by facilitating their work through various services. The company aims to help the MENA region have a future of distinguished scholars in scientific research.

Nawah is the first private Egyptian multi-disciplinary research centre for natural and medical sciences that aims to empower the scientific community and provide various facilities for researchers and scientists to carry out their own research and experiments/

Egypt Ventures secured direct and indirect investments with a total value of EGP 103.8 million during 2020 to develop the entrepreneurial environment and push forward emerging companies in Egypt. This includes EGP 72.4 million direct investments in six companies and EGP 31.4 million indirect investments in a business accelerator. This brings the total investments, since the company was established in 2017, to about EGP 306.2 million in 150 companies, of which EGP 139.9 million are direct investments and EGP 166.3 million are indirect investments.

According to the 2020 annual report of the Ministry of International Cooperation titled “International Partnerships for Sustainable Development”, the ministry secured development financing agreements worth $9.8 billion during the year; $6.7 billion for financing sovereign projects, and $3.1 billion in support of the private sector.

Within the portfolio of the Ministry of International Cooperation, there are currently 34 projects in innovation, digitalisation and entrepreneurship contributing to 13 of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with a total development financing of $1.014 billion; 4% of Egypt’s ODA portfolio. The total ODA portfolio amounts to $25 billion.