The Capital Quest | Egyptian fintech Money Fellows, Nigerian proptech SmallSmall raise VC funding

Egyptian fintech platform Money Fellows has made the first close of its Series B round with a $31 million investment led by CommerzVentures, Middle East Venture Partners (MEVP) and Arzan Venture Capital.

Invenfin, National Investment Company as well as existing investors such as Partech, Sawari Ventures, 4DX, and P1Ventures also participated in the round.

Founded in 2016 by Adham Badr and Ahmed Wadi, Money Fellows is a mobile-based platform that digitizes money circles or Rotating Savings and Credit Associations (ROSCAs) that are widely known as “Gameya” in Egypt and other Arab countries.

The company claims it has hundreds of thousands of monthly active users and that it recorded 8x year on year growth.

The money will be used by Money Fellows to diversifying its portfolio of services and expanding its product offerings across the B2C & B2B segments, as well as its geographical expansion across Africa and Asia.

Hangwi Muambadzi, Venture Partner at CommerzVentures, said: “Rotating Savings and Credit Associations have been deeply embedded in emerging markets across the world for centuries. It is brilliant to see this new digital ROSCA-driven model emerge from Africa, creating a trusted model of delivering financial solutions and setting a new standard on using localised solutions to solve for global opportunities.”

Laith Zraikat, Partner at Arzan Venture Capital, commented: “This is the second investment of our new Arzan VC Fund III and our largest ticket to date. The innovation and uniqueness of the technology developed by the team has resulted in a highly scalable and frictionless experience for its users who traditionally opted out of the ROSCA model due to the many barriers and risks involved.”

SmallSmall

Lagos-based proptech startup SmallSmall has secured $3 million in equity and debt funding as part of its seed funding from Techstars, Oyster VC, Asymmetry Ventures, Vivaz and Niche Capital besides several angel investors.

Out of the total, $2 million came in the form of equity and the rest as debt, giving it resources to expand to more cities over the next 5-6 months.

Cofounded four years ago by Tunde Balogun, Naomi Olaghere and Pidah Tnadah, the firm was previous operating as RentSmallSmall.

SmallSmall had previously bagged $120,000 as part of being the first African proptech startup to get into Techstars Toronto Accelerator Program last year.

Kiwe

Egypt-based fintech valU has bought a minority stake in social payment app Kiwe for an undisclosed amount.

Founded in 2018 by Omar Kamel, Fatma Ibrahim and Mohamed Khalifa, Kiwe targets young users, allowing them to collect, send and spend money through its app.

It also offers a digital payment platform for small businesses and startups.

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