Egyptian e-commerce startup, Wasla secures $9 million
Wasla, an Egyptian ecommerce startup, has received a $9 million investment from Contact Financial Holding, the country’s largest non-bank financial services provider.
Contact will invest up to $9 million in Wasla’s product rollout and regional expansion, with the goal of realizing the startup’s vision of enabling e-commerce, payments, and credit for a broad audience in emerging markets.
Wasla is the first mobile web browser and desktop extension for developing markets, founded in 2019 by Mahmoud El Said, Serag Meneassy, and Taymour Sabry. It allows users to save money, pay securely, improve their credit, and gain access to flexible and convenient financing.
Wasla is currently focusing on improving customers’ e-commerce search and discovery experiences by aggregating deals from over 100 local and regional e-commerce businesses.
“Having previously worked with the Contact team, I was always astounded by what they have built as the region’s premier consumer finance platform,” said Wasla CEO Mahmoud El-Said. This is why we believe that by capitalizing on our contacts’ market position, experience, and fully digitized loan origination process, we will be able to broaden our offering catering to the online shopping experience by introducing entirely new ways to assist consumers in saving money on each online purchase, paying securely, building their credit profiles, and borrowing flexibly.”
Contact and Wasla will work together to expand e-commerce adoption in emerging markets through their respective tools, which will be supplemented by a new suite of financial services capabilities, including online payments and Buy Now Pay Later.
