PropTech Nawy Secures First External Funding from Sawiris Family

Egyptian end-to-end property technology (proptech) startup, Nawy, has secured its first source of external funding, an undisclosed seven-figure investment in a seed round led by the country’s richest family, the Sawiris family office, with participation from angel investors including Etisalat Group CEO Hatem Dowidar.

The real estate company, which was co-founded in 2016 by Mohyamed Abou Ghanima, Abdel-Azim Osman, Ahmed Raea, Aly Rafea, and Mostafa El Beltagy, lists thousands of properties on its platform for potential home-buyers to browse through gated community properties, providing information and insights for would-be customers.

“There’s a considerable chunk of time lost from a homebuyer’s end due to the lack of information and transparency, which breeds anxiety within customers," says Nawy’s CEO, Mostafa El Beltagy, as he lays out the company’s solutions.

The startup reveals that despite the industry-wide disruptions and turbulence in real-estate over the past 18 months, it remains set for 300% growth in 2021.

“In little over five years, Nawy has served over 30,000 individuals on their quest to find their perfectly matched property, selling billions of pounds in GMV [Gross Merchandise Value]," the company states.

The new investment will be used to diversify services, expand the company’s team to serve more areas across Egypt, and improve its technology, building on the $200,000 of internal funding that Nawy has received from its co-founders over the past five years.

“Within the realms of PropTech, there’s a breakneck speed of evolution in service offerings, and how to better offer a fully-integrated model that can be executed in Egypt," said Onsi Naguib Sawiris, the official head of the Sawiris family office.

While Nawy has no set plans for expansion to other countries in the immediate future, it still maintains a vision of expanding operations into the Middle East and Africa, primarily eyeing Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and South Africa, according to co-founder Osman.