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Disrupt Africa: Egypt is Leading African Tech Hub in 2019

10 March 2020

(FinTech Egypt – Egypt Today)

Disrupt Africa has recently announced that Egypt is the leading African country in terms of the amount of tech startups that have secured investment over last year, as per the African Tech Startups Funding Report 2019.

A total of 88 Egyptian tech startups claim that honor, more than any other African country and accounting for 28.3% of the total. With a total secured amount of $90 million, these prominent startups have raised funding that surpasses South Africa and is only bettered by Kenya and Nigeria. This figure represents 17.4% of the overall funds raised in Africa in 2019, up 45.5% from 2018, resulting in Africa now having a ‘Big Four’, up from a ‘Big Three’ (South Africa, Kenya and Nigeria)

2019 was a year for the books in general, with a record-breaking 311 companies raising a total of $491.6 million worth of investments, where Egypt was the breakthrough market of the year. The managing partner of Cairo-based venture capitalist firm Algebra Ventures Tarek Assaad stated that Egypt is becoming an integral hub in the continent in terms of attracting investments, due to the vast macroeconomic improvements and also the attractive market potential of a large population with a largely underserved consumer base.

Commenting on the role of the Central Bank of Egypt in promoting FinTech, Mr Assaad said: “In FinTech, the central bank is taking unprecedented steps to work with tech startups which has encouraged many entrepreneurs to tackle that space.”

The explosive success of companies like transport startup Swvl that took the public transportation industry in Egypt by storm and expanded into Kenya have restored the investors’ confidence in the Egyptian startup market. Fawry, one of the first-ever FinTech companies in Egypt, also became the first VC-backed Egyptian company to go public in early 2019, further emphasizing the startup market’s potential of delivering quality products and services. There is no doubt that 2019 was the year that positioned Egypt on the regional FinTech scene, delivering promises that 2020 will capitalize on that success and witness growth that the nation has yet to experience in this sector. FinTech experts will definitely keep a close eye on emerging FinTech startups in Egypt to identify the next big thing in a country that keeps on impacting the others around it.

Tags

South Africa, Kenya, Nigeria, Fawry, Adzily, Swvl, Algebra Ventures, SMEs, Central Bank of Egypt, CBE, VCs, startups, Big Four, Africa, Disrupt Africa 2019