Weekly Market Highlights
30th of April 2026
BRKZ secured a strategic investment from SIC to accelerate the growth of its construction procurement and supply chain digitization platform in Saudi Arabia.
Comfi raised $65 million in a pre-Series round to scale its embedded financing and BNPL offerings across the MENA region.
Udora secured a $10 million private round to expand its online gifting platform across MENA, with a planned entry into Saudi Arabia in Q3 2026.
GIZ Egypt, in partnership with enpact, launched the “Scale It Forward programme," a new initiative aimed at closing Egypt’s venture debt gap by providing non-dilutive financing to growth-stage startups and scaleups.
Lola closed a $3 million seed round to support its expansion and operations across the GCC region and further develop its product offering.
Vodafone Qatar acquired Maktapp to strengthen its SME-focused fintech and digital services capabilities and expand its enterprise offering.
Shorooq invested in Chazms’ $10.3 million round, backing its model that converts vehicles into data-driven financial assets.
Tether and Fasset launched a gold-backed Visa card that integrates digital assets with traditional payments to enable asset-backed spending.
The Global AI Show 2026 will be held in Riyadh, gathering global AI leaders and reinforcing Saudi Arabia’s positioning as an AI hub.
Creative Zone, Rakez, and Mashreq Neo Biz partnered to launch a program supporting young entrepreneurs with streamlined business setup and banking solutions in the UAE.
The Small and Medium Enterprises General Authority (Monsha’at) announced the launch of the Sports Innovation Incubator, in partnership with RSport Holding, aiming to provide an integrated platform to support entrepreneurial projects in the sports sector.
Bank Albilad announced the establishment of a wholly owned subsidiary named Dafaa Finance, to engage in consumer finance activities in Saudi Arabia, as part of a move aimed at expanding its range of financial services for individuals.
Digital Knowledge, the Saudi platform specialized in financial media and digital publications, announced the signing of an acquisition agreement with Rain, one of the largest cryptocurrency trading platforms in the region.
Paramount has secured major financing support from Gulf sovereign wealth funds to execute its acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery in a deal valued at approximately $111 billion, positioning foreign investors to potentially own nearly half of the shares in the new entity once the transaction is completed.
MENA startups raised $850 million in the first quarter of 2026, according to Jawlah. The update provides a snapshot of regional funding activity for the quarter.
SoftBank is creating a robotics and AI company named Roze focused on automating data center construction, and is targeting a potential IPO valuation of around $100 billion in the US.
SpaceX has struck a deal with Cursor, giving it an option to acquire the AI coding startup for $60 billion later this year, or alternatively pay $10 billion for a strategic collaboration on AI development.
