Dubai’s Zest Fairness raises $4.3 million led by Prosus to digitize non-public market transactions 

UAE-based non-public market infrastructure platform Zest Fairness has raised $4.3 million in a pre-Collection A funding spherical led by Prosus Ventures, with participation from Morgan Stanley Inclusive & Sustainable Ventures (MSISV), it introduced as we speak.

Based in 2021 by Zuhair Shamma and Rawan Baddour, Zest Fairness initially began as a market to allow secondary share buying and selling in startups, serving to shareholders and buyers purchase and promote stakes extra simply.

It has since developed into an infrastructure play that simplifies how non-public corporations and buyers full monetary transactions. The platform digitizes processes that historically contain mountains of paperwork, a number of intermediaries, and excessive charges.

The Dubai-headquartered startup focuses totally on offers beneath $100 million; transactions typically too small for main funding banks however nonetheless advanced sufficient to create complications for the events concerned. So far, Zest Fairness has facilitated over $155 million in transaction worth throughout greater than 115 offers.

Certainly one of Zest’s key choices permits a number of buyers to pool their capital right into a single authorized automobile (SPV), making it simpler for them to collectively spend money on non-public corporations. This course of, which historically requires intensive authorized coordination, can now be accomplished extra effectively by means of their digital platform.

“This funding milestone permits us to proceed in our mission to take away friction from non-public funding offers,” mentioned Zuhair Shamma, Co-founder and CEO of Zest Fairness. “We’re reworking processes that sometimes require weeks of paperwork and quite a few middlemen into streamlined digital workflows.”

The corporate plans to make use of the recent capital to increase its presence in Saudi Arabia and the UAE, rent specialised expertise, develop new merchandise, and scale its expertise infrastructure.

“Zest Fairness is constructing the material that brings collectively non-public markets in rising economies,” mentioned Robin Voogd, Head of Center East Investments at Prosus Ventures. “Their imaginative and prescient aligns completely with our deal with supporting modern monetary infrastructure in high-growth areas.”

Rawan Baddour, Co-founder of Zest Fairness, added that “MSISV’s experience can be key to scaling sustainably and compliantly” as the corporate expands its operations throughout the GCC.

It has beforehand raised $5.7 million, together with a $3.8 million seed spherical led by Center East Enterprise Companions, in 2023.

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