RIYADH: The Sovereign Fund of Egypt and EFG Hermes’s Egypt Education Platform have inked an agreement worth 500 million Egyptian pounds ($25 million) to acquire a 56 percent stake in education platform Selah El Telmeez, Asharq reported on Tuesday citing people familiar with the matter.
Established in the 1960s, Selah El Telmeez offers education content and learning guides for K-12 students across a variety of subjects.
“Our primary objective going into this partnership is to capitalize on the existing wide spectrum of globally available technological advancements,” the fund’s CEO Ayman Soliman said.
“With EEP, we realized the potential of creating diverse and engaging educational content to cater to the advancement of the sizable middle and lower-income segments across Egypt’s 27 governorates,” he added.
Soliman explained that the new investment complements the sovereign fund’s Education Investment Strategy, which aims to provide a wide segment of Egyptians with affordable innovative educational solutions to support students with their learning challenges.
US law firm White and Case has acted as the legal adviser to the Selah El Telmeez platform, while Egypt’s ADSERO-Ragy Soliman and Partners were the legal advisers to the sovereign fund.
The transfer of the shares is expected to take around two months to be completed, one of the sources told Asharq.
The source added that the EEP will acquire 51 percent of Selah El Telmeez and the sovereign fund will purchase 5 percent of the shares.
“Selah El Telmeez supports millions of students across Egypt, covering almost all governorates with best in industry content and engaging learning materials,” Mostafa Hamdy, co-CEO of Selah El Telmeez, said.
“Our partnership with EEP will enable us to unlock and accelerate our ambitious plan of expanding our full range of services nationwide,” he added.
As per the agreement, Selah El Telmeez will operate independently under the same brand and will continue to be managed by the current team, including CEO Walid Hamdy and co-CEO Hamdy.
EEP’s education platform saw growth over the past three years with its portfolio currently spanning a largely diversified pool of 18 national and international schools and pre-schools operating across Cairo and Alexandria.