Happy Friday, friends 👋

The only real place to start this week is with e-commerce behemoth Noon’s $500M raise as it edges closer to a public market listing. Intensifying competition across some of Noon’s most important verticals, particularly food delivery following the well-documented barnstorming entry of Meituan’s Keeta, has shaken up the regional landscape over the past year.

Back in September, founder Mohamed Alabbar flagged a potential dual listing in 2026 or 2027. With news this week that Travis Kalanick’s CloudKitchens has quietly backtracked on its own Middle East IPO ambitions, shelving plans for a Riyadh and Dubai listing, it will be fascinating to see how Noon’s path to the public markets ultimately plays out, and where it chooses to debut.

Elsewhere, we cover an Algerian startup raise this week that quite literally required us to add a new Algeria category to the site, a reflection of how rarely the country’s startup ecosystem features in regional coverage. Volz operates an online travel booking platform purpose built for the Algerian market, addressing long standing friction points such as local DZD payments and cash on delivery. It’s a textbook example of localisation done well and, notably, also represents a Series A exit for an early stage state backer, which achieved a 3.35x return on its initial investment following the $5M Series A.

Warner Bros. Discovery has, perhaps unsurprisingly, opted to move forward with Netflix as its preferred acquirer over the Paramount led bid, which included a consortium of Gulf backers spanning Saudi Arabia, Qatar, the UAE, alongside Jared Kushner’s Affinity Partners. We break down what happened and how the Gulf’s Hollywood ambitions unravelled, at least for now.

FYI, we’ll be taking a short Winter break from newsletter duties over the next two weeks. The FWDstart Podcast will continue its weekly release cadence however, so keep an eye out for a really interesting conversation on AI and productivity landing this coming Monday.

This week’s round-up is a 5 min read:

noon (🇸🇦 KSA / 🇦🇪 UAE), a regional e-commerce platform operating online marketplace, food delivery and grocery services across Saudi Arabia, the UAE and Egypt, has raised $500M from existing backers including PIF and founder Mohammed Alabbar, bringing total funding to $3.2B at a valuation near $10B, as the company works towards a potential dual IPO in Saudi Arabia and the UAE within two years.

Premialab (🇦🇪 UAE), a global data, analytics and risk management platform serving the $800B quantitative investment strategies (QIS) market with a proprietary database of over 7,000 strategies from major investment banks, has raised $220M growth investment led by KKR with participation from existing investor Balderton, to accelerate global expansion, strengthen core systems and scale its execution product developed in partnership with Eurex.

Nawah Scientific (🇪🇬 Egypt), a deeptech cloud lab platform enabling remote access to advanced scientific and industrial testing services across life sciences, food, agriculture and pharmaceuticals, has raised $23M Series A in equity and debt led by Life Ventures Holding with participation from Den Ventures, Empire M, AfricInvest and Elsewedy, to build a 10,000-sqm global R&D centre in Rwanda, double lab capacity in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and expand across North Africa and Europe.

VOLZ (🇩🇿 Algeria), a traveltech platform enabling flight bookings in Algerian dinars with cash-on-delivery and online payment options, has raised $5M Series A led by Tell Group with participation from Groupe GIBA, marking Algeria's largest local-currency startup round and the first exit for the Algerian Startup Fund (ASF) at 3.35x return, to launch new consumer and corporate travel products and expand across North and West Africa.

Relik (🇦🇪 UAE), an AI-powered authentication platform creating "digital DNA" for physical assets to verify collectibles, art and cultural treasures without external hardware, has closed a Seed round from KBW Ventures, Naatt Holding, Fort Holding and Ayman Sejiny, to accelerate expansion across sports, luxury and heritage markets globally.

iVoiceUp (🇪🇬 Egypt), an AI-powered whistleblowing and ethics case management platform serving over 1 million users with features including anonymous reporting and AI investigator bots, has closed a funding round led by A15, to deepen market penetration across Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE and roll out next-generation capabilities including AI-powered anonymous video interviewing.

QPioneers (🇸🇦 KSA), an AI-powered startup OS combining collaboration tools, operations management and intelligent analytics with an automated "QP Agent" assistant, has closed its first funding round from Q Fund (Qewam Holding's investment arm), to scale its integrated platform for growth-focused teams across regional and global markets.

Orion (🇸🇦 KSA), a fintech startup building AI-powered algorithmic trading platforms with quantitative and automated analysis capabilities for Saudi and global financial markets, has closed a pre-Seed round to develop advanced trading models, expand data infrastructure, integrate with local and international brokers, and attract specialised talent in AI and quantitative investment.

🇲🇦 Morocco has announced it will invest $140M into its startup ecosystem under the Digital Morocco 2030 strategy, with $81M allocated to venture-building programs, $49M to venture capital, and $7.6M to expanding the Technopark network. The funding is aimed at scaling early-stage formation, crowding in private capital, and accelerating startup creation, with targets of 1,000 startups by 2026 and 3,000 by 2030.

🇸🇦 India Accelerator has launched a $15 million fund to support Indian startups expanding into Saudi Arabia, backed by the NTDP through its Empowering Accelerators initiative. The fund will target high-growth sectors including AI, sustainability, electric mobility, real estate tech and deep tech, selecting 8–10 startups for an initial cohort set to begin operating in the Kingdom in March 2026.

🇺🇸🌍 Propeller has launched Kernel Camp, an eight-week AI infrastructure and deep-tech residency in Silicon Valley for early-stage MENA founders, with the first cohort running in San Francisco in April–May 2026. The fully sponsored programme is targeting technically strong, demo-ready teams and offers housing, expert-led sessions, one-on-one mentorship, site visits, and a demo day with Propeller’s Silicon Valley network. Kernel Camp follows the recent launch of Propeller’s $50M Fund III.

🇸🇦 Prince Khaled bin Alwaleed says KBW Ventures is postponing plans for a dedicated fund and shifting decisively toward growth-stage tech investments, citing the need for flexibility amid a more selective venture market. Speaking at ADFW, the Saudi prince said KBW will continue deploying capital as a self-funded vehicle, focusing primarily on Series A and above while taking a more cautious approach to pre-seed and seed. The firm’s activity remains concentrated in the US and GCC, with strongest investor appetite in fintech, logistics, healthtech and edtech.

🇦🇪🇮🇪 Hub71 has signed a partnership with Ireland-based Venturewave Capital, becoming Hub71’s first Irish VC partner, supporting startups across sectors including health, education, agri-food, climate and sustainable finance. The agreement creates a formal route for Irish startups to scale via Hub71 in Abu Dhabi, while giving Hub71 founders access to Venturewave’s network in Europe and North America.

The Gulf states' unprecedented alliance to claim a stake in Warner Bros. Discovery ended this week not with a dramatic counterbid, but with a quiet unraveling. Jared Kushner's Affinity Partners withdrew from Paramount's $108 billion hostile offer on Tuesday. The next day, Warner Bros. Discovery's board unanimously rejected the bid, accusing Paramount of misleading shareholders about its financing and urging investors to stick with Netflix's "superior" proposal.

The collapse came faster than anyone anticipated, and the Trump factor, which Paramount had hoped would be an asset, may have accelerated it.

🧠 stc group’s data centre arm center3 and HUMAIN are launching a new joint venture to build and operate next-gen AI data centres with capacity of up to 1GW.

The partnership will start with up to 250MW of initial capacity, combining center3’s regional data centre footprint and subsea connectivity with HUMAIN’s full-stack AI mandate, spanning hyperscale infrastructure, cloud platforms, and advanced AI models.

The facilities will be designed specifically for high-density, low-latency AI workloads such as large language models and mission-critical applications, addressing demand that conventional data centres cannot support.

📦 Saudi last-mile delivery firm Mr Mandoob is preparing for an IPO in the first half of 2026 after its valuation surpassed $213m, according to CEO Obaid Al-Enazi, who said the company is working with regulators on listing procedures while expanding partnerships, services and technology to serve more than 14M users.

The company is expected to list on Nomu, having appointed Emkan Alarabiya as financial adviser in 2023, in line with earlier comments from founder Hammoud Al-Ghosn.

Founded with $227k in self-funding, Mr Mandoob has raised $22.7m over the past four years to scale operations nationwide, and Al-Enazi said consolidation among local players alongside global entrants would ultimately support growth in Saudi Arabia’s delivery sector.