Happy Friday, friends 👋

And with that, the condensed regional event season has all but drawn to a close. If you're like us, you're tired and your social battery is running dangerously close to empty.

This week's edition is especially meaty, so much so that we'd recommend reading it online if at all possible. We've had to bump public markets, SWF, and ecosystem news to the web version to prevent things getting cut off by your email providers.

We'll keep the exposition and commentary to a minimum on this occasion, but we do want to quickly thank our partner for this edition, HubSpot, who are running a cold email masterclass next week that we'd recommend you check out!

This and much more below 👇

This week’s round-up is a 5 min read:

From cold email to closed deal — scale your startup's pipeline without hurting deliverability or deal quality.

17th February @ 7pm GST (Replay Available)

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SiFi (🇸🇦 KSA), a spend management platform enabling finance teams to automate expenses, issue corporate cards, and execute vendor payments, has raised $20M in a Series A round, led by Ra'ed Ventures, with participation from QED Investors, Breyer Capital, MEVP, Sanabil Investments, Khawarizmi Ventures, SEEDRA Ventures, Rua Growth Fund, anb capital, and Tech Invest Com.

Safqah Capital (🇸🇦 KSA), a fintech providing Shariah-compliant structured financing for SME real estate developers, has raised $15.2M in a Seed round, one of the largest pure equity seeds in the Kingdom, led by Shorooq, anb Seed Fund, and Rua Growth Fund, with participation from Sharaka Capital, COTU Ventures, Sadu Capital, 500 Global, Suhail Ventures, MEVP, Waad Invest, JOA Capital, and others.

Smart Bricks (🇦🇪 UAE), an AI-native infrastructure layer for global real estate enabling end-to-end discovery, underwriting, and execution through agentic AI, has raised $5M in a Pre-Seed round, led by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z Speedrun), with participation from South Loop Ventures, Cornerstone VC, Techstars, and angel investors, to scale coverage across key global real estate markets.

iBLOXX Studios (🇦🇪 UAE), a Web3 gaming studio developing blockchain-enabled multiplayer games including mobile third-person shooter StrayShot, has raised over $5M from unnamed investors.

InvestSky (🇦🇪 UAE), a social trading platform offering regulated access to local and US equities across MENA, has raised $4M in a Seed round, backed by Emkan Capital, Run Ventures, S3 Ventures (by Joa Capital), and the Al-Romaizan Family Office, to support its expansion into Saudi Arabia following CMA license approval and a strategic partnership with anb Capital.

omnispay (🇦🇪 UAE), an SME payments platform evolving into a full finance solution covering cash flow, collections, payments, and embedded credit, has raised $2M in a Pre-Series A round, led by Infinity Value Capital Group, to expand across the GCC including Saudi Arabia.

QuicKart (🇦🇪 UAE), a direct farm-to-home fresh commerce platform connecting households and HoReCa businesses with local farms across the UAE, has raised $1.5M in a Seed round, led by Orbit Ventures, with participation from angel investors and family offices.

Tactful AI (🇪🇬 Egypt), an agentic AI-powered customer experience platform enabling enterprises to move from traditional automation to end-to-end AI-driven CX execution, has raised $1M in a pre-Series A round, co-led by Foras AI and M Empire, to strengthen growth in Egypt and validate expansion into new EMEA markets.

Routech Express (🇸🇦 KSA), a digital shipping platform aggregating multiple carriers for instant price comparison, booking, payment, and shipment tracking, has raised $1M in a pre-Seed round, led by Q Fund with participation from angel investors.

ThrowMeNot (🇦🇪 UAE), a sustainability-focused marketplace redistributing near-expiry and surplus goods at up to 90% off retail prices, has raised $550K in a Pre-Seed round, led by Sheikh Ahmed bin Mana Al Maktoum.

Jazr.io (🇸🇦 KSA), an AI-powered accounting and inventory management platform for restaurants and cafés, has raised $213K in a pre-Seed round, from angel investors, to develop compliance tools, AI-driven automation, and product development.

Nutra-GreeniX (🇸🇾 Syria), an agritech startup providing sustainable, clean-energy-powered nutritional solutions for the livestock sector, has raised $200K in a Seed round, led by EBLA Ventures, with participation from Syrian and Saudi angel investors.

Metabolic (🇦🇪 UAE), the parent company of GluCare.Health and Zone.Health operating a hybrid metabolic care model, has secured an undisclosed strategic growth capital facility in partnership with RAKBANK, combining debt and founder equity, to expand from Dubai into London and the United States.

XSquare (🇦🇪 UAE), a B2B fintech providing a unified platform for banking and payment operations integrating invoicing, payouts, and ERP reconciliation, has raised an undisclosed amount from AngelSpark.

🎖️ MASNA Ventures is raising Saudi's first defence-focused VC fund, targeting at least $100M from US and Saudi investors to back drone systems, precision-guided munitions, and AI-enabled defence tech in the US and allied countries. Portfolio companies will establish manufacturing operations in the Kingdom, aligning with Saudi's goal to localise 50% of defence spending by 2030 (currently 75% of its $64B annual military budget flows abroad). The launch comes as Saudi-US defence ties deepen following the Kingdom's major non-NATO ally designation in November.

🤖 Abu Dhabi's MGX co-led Anthropic's $30B Series G alongside GIC and Coatue, with Qatar Investment Authority also participating as a significant investor, valuing the Claude-maker at $380B (up from $183B in its Series F just months ago). The round marks a deepening Gulf stake in the AI race – MGX was notably absent from the Series F that QIA joined, but is now co-leading alongside D.E. Shaw Ventures and Founders Fund.

🤖 QIA has joined a $520M round for humanoid robot maker Apptronik at a $5B valuation, investing alongside Google and Mercedes-Benz in the Texas-based company's Apollo robot. The deal continues QIA's 2026 advanced tech spree – the $557B sovereign fund has also backed Elon Musk's xAI, chipmaker Positron, and participated in Anthropic's Series F and G rounds – despite CEO Mohammed Al-Sowaidi recently warning about "short-term heat" in AI and pledging a more selective approach.

💳 Saudi Arabia's crackdown on credit card issuance has caught several fintechs in the crossfire, according to reporting from Kristie Neo's Substack. UAE-based Alaan (backed by Peak XV Partners and Y Combinator after a $48M Series A in August 2025) has paused Saudi operations after SAMA ordered card issuer Neoleap to suspend its BIN sponsorship program in December 2025.

Pemo and Pluto, which also relied on Neoleap's card issuing services, were similarly affected. The crackdown follows questions about whether Neoleap, a subsidiary of Al Rajhi Bank, was correctly licensed by SAMA, with CEO Abdullah Alibrahim departing in January 2026. Full piece here.

🛵 Uber is paying $335M to acquire Getir's food delivery business from Mubadala, plus investing $100M for a 15% stake in Getir's broader operations. Mubadala invested at least $580M into the Turkish rapid delivery startup – leading the 2022 Series E at a $12B valuation, providing $80M in emergency loans in early 2024, and injecting $250M to take control last June – exiting now at $435M. Uber will combine Getir with Trendyol GO (which it acquired 85% of for $700M last year) to consolidate its Turkish delivery position.

🏢 Clara, the largest licensed corporate service provider in ADGM, has been acquired by Singapore-based Ascentium for an undisclosed amount. Founded in 2018 and spun out of startup law firm Support Legal, Clara raised approximately $5.6M from Techstars, 500 Global, Wamda Capital, Shorooq, VentureSouq, and others before pivoting from legaltech platform to regulated CSP through acquisitions of Foundra (2020) and BOTH Corporate Services (2023).

The company manages around 2,000 entities across ADGM and DIFC, serving startups, VCs, accelerators, and government-related entities with incorporation, compliance, cap table management, and data rooms. Ascentium, which serves 60,000+ client entities across 45 cities, gains its first UAE presence through the deal.

🏥 Anterior, founded by Libyan-born physician Dr Abdel Mahmoud, raised $40M (bringing total funding to $64M) for its AI platform that automates clinical review for health plans. The round saw continued backing from Sequoia Capital and NEA alongside new investors FPV Ventures and Kinnevik.

Mahmoud, who came to the UK as a refugee at eight, built a software business by 15, became the youngest infantry officer in the UK at 18 via Sandhurst, and later worked in product at Facebook and Google before founding Anterior. The platform now gets prior authorisations approved in ~155 seconds with 99.24% clinical accuracy (independently validated), supporting health plans covering 50M people.

📉 Banks are pushing Saudi Arabia's Capital Market Authority to reconsider guidance encouraging 30% retail allocations in IPOs, arguing it's squeezing foreign institutional investor

s and weakening listing performance during a period of soft demand, Bloomberg reports. Only two of the 10 largest Saudi IPOs last year trade above offer price, retail trading volumes hit their lowest since 2020 in December, and the Tadawul had its worst year in a decade in 2025.

A group of banks, including some of the kingdom's largest ECM advisers, is planning a formal written complaint, warning that retail investors tend to sell shortly after listings and that issuers may need steeper discounts to fill quotas.

🇪🇬 Egypt has launched the "Egypt Startup Charter", the country's first government-backed framework for startups, following year-long consultations with 15 government entities and 250+ ecosystem stakeholders. The charter introduces Egypt's first official definition of a startup (enabling access to incentives), targets supporting 5,000 startups and creating 500,000 jobs over five years, and includes a unified financing initiative aiming to mobilise $1B through government funding, guarantees, and private sector co-investment. A scale-up program will help late-stage companies attract major investments, pursue IPOs, and create new unicorns.