Cairo - Mubasher: Dubai-based ride-sharing app Swvl is planning to increase its valuation to $15 billion in 2022 from the current $1.5 billion, the CEO Mostafa Kandil said in his meeting with the Egyptian Prime Minister, Mostafa Madbouly.

The mobility company is keen on expanding its investments in the Egyptian transportation sector which plays a vital role in the market, the Egyptian entrepreneur noted in a cabinet statement on Tuesday. 

Swvl currently operates in 10 cities in Egypt, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Kenya, and Pakistan, where more than 1.4 million passengers booked over 46 million rides to date and there are also plans to acquire a Europe-based firm, the CEO added. 

In 2017, Kandil co-founded Swvl as a bus-hailing service in Egypt, before moving its headquarters to Dubai.

Swvl signed a deal to merge with Queen's Gambit Growth Capital, a female-led special purpose acquisition company (SPAC).

This made the mobility company the first $1.5 billion unicorn in the Middle East to list on Nasdaq and Kandil the second youngest CEO of a publicly-traded company on the exchange.