CAIRO: The venture capital activity in the Middle East and North Africa region increased 46 percent to $1.8 billion in the first half of 2022, according to Dubai-based startup data-crunching firm MAGNiTT.
According to the latest study, the total number of deals in the MENA region increased by 2 percent to 400 during the period under review. However, the region clocked 33 VC exits between January and June this year.
While the MENA region venture capital market registered encouraging growth between January and June, it paled in comparison to other markets such as Turkey and Europe.
For instance, Turkey alone raised $1.4 billion of venture funding in the first half of 2022 compared to $1.8 billion in the MENA region which, according to the World Bank, includes 21 countries.
On the other hand, European startups managed to raise $58.6 billion in the first half of 2022, according to the Silicon Valley Bank, while the Latin American market deployed $5.4 billion in investments in the same period, according to a survey by the Latin American Association of Private Equity & Venture Capital.
Moreover, Saudi Arabia has been a key player in boosting the region’s venture ecosystem with huge momentum in funding deals and amounts.
MAGNiTT further reported that the Kingdom saw 79 deals in the first half of 2022, an increase of 36 percent over the same period last year.
It also indicated that 88 investors participated in funding deployed by Saudi startups, up by 126 percent in the first half of 2022 over the year-ago period as 42 percent of investors were from outside the Kingdom.
Saudi Arabia was the second largest venture-capital market in the Middle East and North Africa in total transactions and funding.
The MENA region is moving in parallel with other global markets to deploy funding to specific industries with the highest focus.
Fintech had the highest number of transactions with 17 deals, followed by logistics with 12 deals, and e-commerce with eight deals in the first half of 2022.
In Europe, fintech accounted for almost a quarter of all funding deployed in the same period raising $15.6 billion across 651 deals, while logistics startups raised $5.7 billion.
Turkey’s total funding in the first half of 2022 was bolstered thanks to logistics startup Getir’s $768 million series E round.