Meet the 14 startups from third batch of 500 Startups’ Series A Program ‘MENA Dojo’

500 Startups’ MENA-focused fund 500 Falcons that recently announced its oversubscribed final closing at $33 million, today has revealed the startups that have joined the third batch of its Series A program ‘MENA Dojo’. The four-week program that was launched in 2017 in MENA, selects startups that have significant traction and are intending to raise a Series within 6-9 months. MENA Dojo is run by 500’s global mentors and a team of experts who the selected startup increase their growth by sharing best practices and ‘proven growth techniques’.

The program that kicked-off in Kuwait last month includes startups from Egypt, United Arab Emirates, Lebanon, Qatar, Jordan, and Kuwait. All of the selected startups receive an investment of $150,000 from 500 Falcons.

These are the fourteen startups that are part of this third batch of MENA Dojo.

ADGS Computer System

Founded by Hassan Al Ansari & Christophe Billiottet, ADG Computer System is a Doha-based R&D startup working in the fields of behavioral biometrics, artificial intelligence applied to human language, and emergent behavior applied to biomedical simulations. ADGS has developed Strokk, a B2B software that makes stolen passwords useless to hackers by recognizing how users type. The keystroke dynamics solution that runs quietly in the background without even users knowing that they’re using it makes the compromised password (in case of a security breach) completely useless to a hacker as it understands how each user types.

Ajar Online

Ajar Online, founded by Shaheen Al Khudhari, is a Kuwait-based startup that helps landlords and real-estate agents collect rent online and manage their properties through its cloud-based service. It streamlines the rent payment and collection process via SMS and email which gives tenants the comfort of paying their rent anytime, anywhere, within 60 seconds using different payment methods including debit/credit cards, KNET or Sadad. Apart from that, Ajar Online provides its clients with different property management tools to make it easy for them to manage their properties and use analytical data to make better decisions.

AlgoDriven

Founded by Glenn Harwood & Jaron Crossland, AlgoDriven helps car dealers, finance teams and insurance companies accurately price cars by providing comprehensive, accurate and actionable vehicle identification and pricing data, through data-driven appraisals, vehicle identification solutions, and used car price prediction.

Buseet

Founded by Amr Elsawy, Buseet is a Cairo-based premium mass transportation platform that offers commuters with modern buses, which are cheaper than Uber and Careem and better than the public transportation options, through its mobile app.

Coded

Coded is a Kuwait-based coding academy that teaches people how to code, through offline bootcamps and online courses. Founded by Ahmad Marafi and Hashim Bahbahani, the startup also works with enterprise clients including both corporates and government institutions, offering customized bootcamps tailored to their specific needs.

Dailymealz

Saudi-based Dailymealz, founded by Mohamed ElZalabany, Abdelrahman Said, Abdallah Mohamed and Motaz AbuOnq, is a subscription-based food delivery service focused that delivers lunch to individuals at their workplaces in Riyadh, Dammam & Khobar.

Fatora.io

Founded by Waleed Alyafie, Fatora.io is a Qatar-based online invoicing platform that enables businesses to create online invoices and request payments from their customers by sharing the invoice through email, WhatsApp or SMS. The customers have the option to make payments through credit cards, cash, bank transfers, and PayPal.

Garment IO

Founded by Ahmed Nounou & Mahmoud Sabae, Garment IO is an Egypt-based a plug-and-play garment manufacturing management solution that combines software and hardware to help factory managers get the full picture of production processes, worker performance and production costs, all of which can be accessed online on Garment IO’s web-based platform.

Keepface

Dubai-based Keepface is an online influencer marketing platform that connects brands with social media influencers and helps them launch campaigns and measure the performance. Founded by Vagif Abbasov, Elshad Yusifli, Emin Valiyev, the startup claims to have over 18,000 influencers registered on their platform.

Jobedu

Founded by Tamer AlMasri, Jobedu is a streetwear brand that produces the works of talented local, regional and international designers on different products including t-shirts, hoodies, accessories, and prints, and sells them on its ecommerce platform shipping them all across the world. The startup is an official merchandising partner for The Walt Disney Company MENA and Warner Bros EMEA.

Magnitt

Dubai-based Magnitt is an online data and new aggregation platform for startups in the Middle East & North Africa. Magnitt, founded by Philip Bahoshy, claims to have over 10,000 startups in its database and regularly publishes different types of reports on startups and venture capital in the region.

Moodfit

Moodfit, founded by Tarek Jaroudi, Ghassan Abi Fadel & Mohamad Sabouneh, is a Beirut-based online marketplace that matches people with the right interior designer to help them furnish and decorate their spaces. The platform and its design tools can be used to choose a designer who then submits a design that fits the customer’s style and furniture budget. Once the design is finalized, the designer prepares a furniture list with the prices of all the items. The startup also offers the option to purchase and deliver all these items to customer’s doorstep.

Tripdizer

Founded by Ziad Eladawy, Hatem Ayoub, Yara Yehia, Mohamed Mostafa, Tripdizer is Cairo-based travel startup that enables users (mainly millennials) plan and book their personalized travel itineraries by learning about the kind of activities and destinations they’re interested in and their budget, through its online platform.

Vapulus

Vapulus, founded by Abdelrahman Elsharawy, is a Cairo-based global payment gateway that enables businesses to accept payments from customers and provides them access to different customer acquisition and loyalty tools to help them grow the business.

MENA Dojo will conclude with an Investor Day pitch event on May 1st in Kuwait where all these startups will be given a chance to pitch in front of investors from the region and abroad.