Egypt’s largest non-bank financial services provider, Contact Financial Holding (EGX: CNFN.CA), has announced the completion of a strategic investment in Wasla, an e-commerce SuperApp. Wasla’s product rollout and geographical expansion will be supported by Contact through a series of investments totaling up to $9 million, with the goal of realizing Wasla’s mission of enabling e-commerce, payments, and credit for wide audiences in emerging economies.
“Having personally worked with the Contact team before, I was always amazed at what they have been able to build as a leading consumer finance platform in the region. This is why we believe this deep partnership, leveraging contacts market position, experience, and fully digitized loan origination process, will allow usto expand our offering catering to the online shopping experience by introducing completely newways to help consumers save money on each online purchase, pay securely, build their credit profiles, and borrow flexibly,” Mahmoud El Said, CEO of Wasla said.
This round aims to speed up the startup’s geographical expansion as well as the implementation of additional features and products including buy now pay later (BNPL).
Why The Investor Invested
Contact’s mission to allow tech-first ventures in Egypt’s funding ecosystem is bolstered by this investment. The startup has also acquired some traction. Wasla now has 35 employees, 1.5 million app downloads, 8.5x year-over-year increase in total e-commerce traffic, and a new partnership to expand its services around Africa is the world’s fastest-growing consumer market.
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Contact and Wasla will collaborate on realizing the objective of further increasing e-commerce adoption in emerging areas through various tools supported by a new suite of financial services solutions, including online payments and Buy Now Pay Later, as part of this strategic relationship.
Wasla, which will operate as an extension of Contact’s core business, will also help the company to expand into new market segments and attract new user groups.
“With over twenty years of innovation in consumer financial services, this strategic investment demonstrates Contact’s drive to multiply its reach and empower businesses with its advanced credit services platform,” Said Zater, Managing Director and Group CEO of Contact Financial, said. “This partnership comes as Contact continues to extend its credit services platform to serve digital channels. Welook forward to supporting Wasla in its rollout of payments and financing tools, bringing the quality and superior customer experience that has come to be expected of Contact. We will continue to seek new ways with which we can serve our expanding audience with high quality services through a wide variety of channels, continuing to transform the way consumers and businesses access financial services.”
Hazem Moussa, Chairman of Contact Financial, added “We are thrilled to be supporting the Wasla team build out their vision of a digital ecosystem enabling online shopping for all.
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Contact (previously Sarwa Capital) is Egypt’s largest consumer financing platform, and has been changing people’s financial lives since 2001. Contact is the first financial services platform in Egypt to integrate innovative credit scoring and collection processes, allowing Contact to engage consumers from the start of their e-commerce journey while they explore, discover, and shop online.
A Look At What Wasla Does
Founded in 2019 by Mahmoud El Said, Serag Meneassy, and Taymour Sabry, Wasla is the first developing markets mobile web browser and desktop extension that lets users save money, pay securely, improve their credit profiles, and obtain access to flexible and convenient financing. Wasla is focused on optimizing the end-to-end online shopping experience. Wasla is currently focusing on improving the e-commerce search and discovery experience by aggregating discounts for a network of over 100 local and regional e-commerce retailers (similar to US company Honey, which was acquired by PayPal for $4 billion in 2019).
Wasla ecommerce Wasla ecommerce Wasla ecommerce
Charles Rapulu Udoh
Charles Rapulu Udoh is a Lagos-based lawyer who has advised startups across Africa on issues such as startup funding (Venture Capital, Debt financing, private equity, angel investing etc), taxation, strategies, etc. He also has special focus on the protection of business or brands’ intellectual property rights ( such as trademark, patent or design) across Africa and other foreign jurisdictions.
He is well versed on issues of ESG (sustainability), media and entertainment law, corporate finance and governance.
He is also an award-winning writer