We are leading a SAR78.75 million ($21 million) investment round in Unifonic -- the leading cloud communications platform for emerging markets. Our latest portfolio company empowers thousands of companies (including major firms like Careem, Uber and Domino’s Pizza) to communicate with millions of their customers through text & voice solutions by leveraging advanced data analytics and AI.
We are particularly excited about this investment given Unifonic’s leading role in the fast-growing cloud communications market. According to IDC, the Communication Platform as a Service (CPaaS) industry is forecasted to grow from $867 million in 2016 to $8.2 billion in 2021. We think Unifonic is perfectly placed to capitalize on the opportunity that this industry presents.
In our view, Unifonic’s cloud-based communications platform is helping transform major industries. It gives clients like major banks, airlines, and e-commerce companies the ability to send millions of messages in an instant -- allowing them to notify a group of customers of a flight delay, update consumers on an order from their favorite e-commerce store, or even confirm an individual customer bank transaction as a secure and reliable two-factor authentication message. Unifonic offers easy-to-use APIs that allow developers to directly utilize SMS messages and voice calls in their systems and applications.
Our co-investors in this fundraise, which ranks as one of the largest Series A financings in the MENA region, included Riyad Taqnia Fund, Endeavor Catalyst, Elm, and Raed Ventures. The new capital will help accelerate Unifonic’s expansion plans in multiple markets and industries, and support further product platform development.
Unifonic is a great example of the type of founder-driven, capital-efficient businesses we like to invest in. Started by Ahmed and Hassan Hamdan in 2008, Unifonic has since grown into a consistently profitable company with over 100 employees in five different countries.