Week 19’s Biggest Startup Funding Rounds in Africa and the Middle East, Led by ZyG, as E-Commerce AI and Fintech Drew the Biggest Checks

Week 19’s Biggest Startup Funding Rounds in Africa and the Middle East, Led by ZyG, as E-Commerce AI and Fintech Drew the Biggest Checks

Startups across Africa and the Middle East raised a combined $79.5 million this week, based on disclosed funding rounds tracked by Techloy, with Israel and the UAE driving the two largest checks. Saudi Arabia added two healthtech deals, and South Africa and Ghana each contributed to a week that spread across six countries.

The Week’s Largest Startup Funding Rounds

Here are the biggest disclosed startup funding rounds across Africa and the Middle East this week.

/1. ZyG, $60 million, E-Commerce AI, Israel

ZyG was founded in 2025 by the team behind ironSource, the Israeli ad tech company that went public at an $11 billion valuation before merging with Unity.

The Tel Aviv company builds an operating system for direct-to-consumer brands that handles product validation, store building, marketing, logistics, and conversion, running all of it through AI agents rather than requiring founders to hire separate teams for each piece.

The company came out of stealth just two months ago when it announced a $58 million seed round. This $60 million Series A arrived shortly after, valuing ZyG at $500 million. Accel led the round, with Felix Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Lightspeed Venture Partners joining, and Accel partner Sonali De Rycker taking a board seat. The capital goes toward expanding operations and scaling into the US market.

/2. CredibleX, $15 million, Fintech, UAE

Getting a loan as a small business in the UAE has never been straightforward. CredibleX is trying to fix that by making financing available directly inside the tools and platforms those businesses already use every day, so owners are not chasing banks or sitting through lengthy approval processes.

Anand Nagaraj, Ahmad Malik, and Hassan Reda started the company in 2023 and have since signed up over 70 partners. They also landed a $100 million credit line in 2025 to keep the money flowing to borrowers.

This round was led by Mubadala, Abu Dhabi’s sovereign wealth fund, with existing backer Further Ventures also coming back in. The fresh capital goes toward signing more partners, reaching more small businesses, and making the loans themselves faster and easier to access.

/3. Shiprazor, $2.65 million, Logistics, South Africa

Shiprazor connects e-commerce merchants to a network of more than 20 courier partners through Running an online store in South Africa means dealing with multiple courier companies, unpredictable pricing, and deliveries that sometimes just do not show up. Shiprazor puts all of that in one place. Merchants connect once and get access to over 20 courier options, with the platform choosing the right one for each order based on price, speed, and track record.

Sahil Affriya started the Cape Town business in 2023 and it has handled over 1.5 million deliveries since then. Norrsken22 led this round, joined by AAIC, E4E, Tremis Capital, and a handful of angel investors including senior people from Google. The money goes toward adding more courier options, moving into new regions, and reducing the number of failed deliveries.

/4. Metafare, $1 million, Healthtech, Saudi Arabia

Metafare offers health sessions that take under 15 minutes, cover things like fitness, meditation, and therapy, and happen through a headset at home or in the office with no clinic visit required. Each session is built around the individual user.

Ibrahim Almaghlouth started the Riyadh company in 2025 and it has run over 3,000 sessions since mid-2025. A lot of the interest is coming from employers who want to do something real for their staff rather than just hang a poster about wellness. Harmonics Ventures backed this first round alongside regional family offices. The money goes toward better personalisation, more session types, and expanding across the Gulf.

/5. Madeed, $525,000, Healthtech, Saudi Arabia

Madeed is building a preventive health platform in Saudi Arabia that uses advanced biomarker and laboratory testing to identify disease risk before symptoms appear, with results reviewed by physicians and paired with personalised nutrition, lifestyle, and supplement plans for each member.

Founded in 2025 by Dr. Adam Bataineh and based in Riyadh, the company raised an initial $400,000 pre-seed in January led by Vision Ventures. This week it closed additional pre-seed funding from SEEDRA Ventures, Unity Investment Partners, and Seen Growth, bringing its total raised to $925,000.

The company said it attracted 150 subscribers during its pilot phase and is completing operational testing ahead of its official launch. The new capital goes toward product development and expanding clinical and laboratory partnerships across Saudi Arabia.

/6. Rivia Clinics, $200,000, Healthtech, Ghana

Rivia Clinics works on a subscription that gives members access to both physical clinics and online consultations across Ghana, so people are not paying a fresh fee every time they need to see a doctor. 

The Accra company started in 2024 and has already seen over 50,000 patients come through. Village Capital put in the money through a fund backed by the Dutch Entrepreneurial Development Bank and the Netherlands Enterprise Agency. It goes toward adding more clinics, bringing in more members, and building out the online care side. 

/7. VDL Fulfilment, $150,000, Logistics, Ghana

VDL Fulfilment gives African SMEs access to warehousing, order management, and last-mile delivery through a single platform, handling the entire fulfilment operation so merchants can stay focused on sales.

Vanessa Omari started the Accra company in 2020. It has completed over 170,000 orders, supports more than 150 sellers, and has moved over $3.8 million worth of goods since launch. The $150,000 came from the same Village Capital fund that backed Rivia Clinics this week. The funding goes toward warehouse infrastructure, fleet expansion, and building distributed hubs closer to demand.

Other funding announced this week include Siin, a Riyadh-based live shopping platform operating across Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar, and Oman, that brings its total capital raised to $3 million, though the new round amount was not disclosed. The company said the capital goes toward regional expansion and strengthening its seller ecosystem.

Conclusion

With $79.5 million in disclosed funding this week, Israel and the UAE combined for $75 million of it through just two deals, while Saudi Arabia, South Africa, and Ghana made up the rest. Healthtech was the most active sector by deal count, showing up in four of the seven ranked rounds, even as the week’s biggest individual checks went to an e-commerce AI company and a fintech lender.

Week 18’s Biggest Startup Funding Rounds in Africa and the Middle East, Led by Aidoc, as Healthcare AI and Quantum Computing Drew the Biggest Checks

An Israeli medical AI company pulled in $150 million while a quantum computing startup added $140 million, making this one of the heaviest funding weeks the region has seen this year



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