Egyptian payment platform Fawry planning IPO by next year

Cairo-based electronic payment services platform Fawry is planning to go public later this year or in 2020, company’s co-founder and Managing Director Mohamed Okasha told Egyptian publication Al-Mal yesterday. The company plans to list on The Egyptian Exchange (EGX) but hasn’t started working on the public listing procedures yet.

The capital raised through IPO will be used for the expansion of Fawry, the MD said in the interview. He added that the procedures will take at least six months and that the company will start working on them by selecting an investment bank after they make a decision about timing of the IPO.

Founded in 2008 by Ashraf Sabry & Mohamed Okasha, Fawry currently offers over 250 electronic payment services through its network of over 100,000 service points across 300 cities in the country – that include ATMs, mobile wallets, retail shops, post offices, and little vendor kiosks. The company also has its online payment gateway that allows online businesses to collect payments from their customers using different methods including cash, credit cards, and mobile wallet.

The company was acquired by a consortium of investors consisting of Egyptian-American Enterprise Fund, Helios Investment Partners and the MENA Long-Term Value Fund in 2015 who bought 85 percent of Fawry’s stake at the valuation of $100 million. Both the founders, however, stayed with the company and continue to lead it.

Fawry’s MD in the intevriew also said that they’re partnering with one of the largest bank in UAE to launch their operations there within this quarter. Speaking about their expansion plans, he said that the company will be increasing its sales points to 150,000 points by the end of 2019 and further develop the Fawry Pay platform.

H/T: Enterprise