Egypt’s Homzmart raises $23m in expansion push

CAIRO: Cairo-based furniture online marketplace Homzmart has raised $23 million in its latest funding round, as the startup plans to expand its services, the company’s top executive said. “Another major double down on Homzmart’s expansion vision and the solid milestones that the company keeps achieving,” Mahmoud Ibrahim, co-founder and chief executive of Homzmart, said in a LinkedIn post on Monday.

The latest funding round brings the total amount raised by the Egyptian company to nearly $40m. That includes $1.3 million in February 2020 when the company was founded, and $15 million in November for its expansion into Saudi Arabia earlier this year.

Saudi Technology Ventures (STV), the largest technology

venture capital fund in the Middle East with more than $500 million in capital, invested in Homzmart for the first time. Existing investors including Riyadh-based asset manager Impact46, Dubaibased Nuwa Capital, San Francisco-based Rise Capital and Outliers Venture Capital, an early-stage fund with offices in the US and the Middle East, also participated in the company’s latest funding round.

“Homzmart is a building a category-defining company in the $80 billion furniture market with solid unit economics and an experienced team. We are thrilled to double down with [co-founders] Mahmoud and Ibrahim as they expand Homzmart’s footprint to the rest of the region starting with Saudi Arabia,” said Mohammed Almeshekah, managing partner of Outliers Venture Capital.

The e-commerce platform is a one-stop shop that connects consumers with retailers and manufacturers selling home furniture, lighting and decor. Homzmart sales grew more than 30 times in its first year of operation, fuelled by the COVID-19 pandemic, as consumers swapped physical outlets for online shopping sites.