Padmini Gupta

Raed Ventures is pleased to welcome Kushal Shah as Growth Venture Partner. This strategic addition reinforces the firm’s commitment to supporting entrepreneurs across all stages of their journey, from early growth to regional scale. Kushal brings extensive expertise in growth investing, strategy, and ecosystem building across MENA. He spearheaded e& Capital’s Growth Investment team, was a Senior Partner at Roland Berger advising governments and Fortune 500 companies, and is the Founder of Dubai Angel Investors, where he played a pivotal role in strengthening the region’s early-stage ecosystem. In his new role at Raed Ventures, Kushal will focus on identifying high-potential growth-stage opportunities, supporting scaling strategies, and furthering Raed’s mission of building transformative companies in MENA. Omar A. Almajdouie, Founding Partner of Raed Ventures, welcomed Kushal to the firm: "We are excited to have Kushal join our team at Raed Ventures. His deep expertise in growth investing and strategic advisory, combined with his strong track record of ecosystem building, will be instrumental in supporting founders as they scale their companies and create lasting impact." Expressing his enthusiasm, Kushal Shah said: "I am thrilled to join Raed Ventures and contribute to its mission of empowering exceptional founders. Startups at the growth stage play a vital role in driving economic progress and innovation, and I look forward to working with the team to help founders achieve their full potential." Raed Ventures is an early-stage venture capital firm that partners with exceptional founders building transformative companies across MENA. https://lnkd.in/dwzBWBTQ

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Sanjay Nath and Ashish Fafadia, partners at Blume, recently shared perspectives on the India–UAE VC corridor with Swathi Moorthy from The Economic Times . Indian VC activity and startup expansion into the Middle East are accelerating as UAE family offices, sovereign funds, and institutions diversify beyond hydrocarbons. In 2024, Indian startups received about $200 million from Middle Eastern investors, and Indian founders represent an estimated 30% of Dubai’s tech startup community. According to Ashish, capital is shifting from LP commitments to direct investments in companies, with growing UAE interest in backing portfolio companies directly. Funds like ours and Stellaris Venture Partners have raised capital from the region, while Ideaspring Capital and Java Capital are engaging family offices and high-net-worth individuals (HNWIs) in Dubai and Abu Dhabi. Sanjay believes investor mandates are widening beyond energy/real estate into technology—AI infrastructure, fintech, enterprise software, and cross‑border SaaS—enabled by DIFC frameworks, long‑term visas, tax efficiency, and a rapid build‑out of data centers and AI/compute in the UAE. For Indian founders, this means faster enterprise access across the GCC, easier residency and hiring, and proximity to both capital and compute. Read the full article on how capital, compute, and market access are flowing between the UAE and India here: https://lnkd.in/dkemVBq6 Karthik B. Reddy, Arpit Agarwal, Sajith Pai, Rohit Kaul, Ria Shroff Desai, Mitul Mehta, Alok Mehta, Deepika Jain, Sarita Raichura, Gautham Sivaramakrishnan, Vikram Gawande, Elton C.

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#DIFC and Partners for Growth (PFG) have announced a strategic growth debt partnership to scale Dubai’s next generation of technology companies. The collaboration brings together DIFC’s vision to drive the future of finance with PFG’s global expertise in private credit investing, unlocking new funding pathways for high-growth technology companies across Dubai and the GCC. Aligned with the D33 Economic Agenda and DIFC’s 2030 Strategy, the partnership will provide structured growth debt to innovation-driven businesses in sectors such as FinTech, HealthTech, InsurTech, PropTech, SME Digital Finance, and SpaceTech. This milestone reinforces Dubai’s position as a global hub for innovation, entrepreneurship and capital. Read more: https://lnkd.in/dqEd5D8N

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Maalexi secures up to $20M Islamic Credit Facility! The agreement enables Maalexi, the cross-border agri-trade end-to-end transaction platform, to scale in the #UAE and #SaudiArabia while investing in its proprietary #tech stack, including real-time payment #tokenization. Read more here: https://lnkd.in/dvgqFBpy

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If you’re a fintech founder looking for opportunity, Salah Hamawi has a message for you: look to the Middle East. Speaking to Inc. Arabia at this year’s edition of Money20/20 Middle East, Hamawi, who is a Partner at global consulting firm Kearney, pointed out that the region is fast emerging as a global fintech hub—and the opportunity it presents is ripe for the taking. For entrepreneurs thus wanting to make the most out of this ecosystem, Al Hamawi said that the most valuable currency they can make use of isn’t capital—it’s connection. “The one advice I would give fintech founders is network, network, network,” Hamawi said. “Money20/20 is a great example of a platform that brings together all the different players within the sector—you’ve got banks, regulators, consulting firms, and investors. This really is a forum for you to network, to engage, and really support in driving the momentum that we see in this sector.” Check out more of Hamawi's insights in the full video here: https://lnkd.in/dUYXa-Wq #fintech #finance #banking #SaudiArabia #KSA #GCC #MiddleEast #MENA #entrepreneurs #startups #business #leaders #tech #Money2020MiddleEast

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Dubai-headquartered expense management platform Alaan has raised $48 million in Series A funding, the company announced today. The round was led by Peak XV Partners (formerly Sequoia Capital India & SEA) and 885 Capital, with participation from Pioneer Fund and existing investors Y Combinator and 468 Capital. It also includes both primary and secondary investment and drew support from prominent regional operator-angels including Tabby's Hosam Arab, Careem's Mudassir Sheikha, Pleo's Jeppe Rindom, Nomod's Omar Kassim, and popular Emirati creator Khalid Al Ameri, among others. Read more: https://lnkd.in/dqyXbefK Parthi Duraisamy, Ravishankar GV

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At Money20/20 Middle East in Riyadh, we joined a timely conversation on the foundations of lasting investor–founder partnerships. Alongside Bilal Abou-Diab, CFA, Vault's Co-founder (and an Outliers Venture Capital founder), and Ravishankar GV, Vault’s latest backer, the panel discussed why enduring partnerships in venture are rarely born in urgency. They’re seeded with conviction, tested by time, and held together by transparency. In a region where ecosystems are maturing rapidly, being intentional about who you bring on board is as critical as the capital itself. And in venture, capital undeniably enables growth, but the right alignment surely determines outcomes.

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Bluerails - Founded by Jens Joseph Mannanal has officially launched its on-chain treasury platform from its operational hub at the Dubai International Financial Centre (DIFC) Properties. The new platform empowers companies, family offices, and high-net-worth individuals to earn yield on idle capital while retaining the ability to deploy funds instantly anywhere in the world. It consolidates fiat-to-stable conversions, yield-generation products, and programmable payout rails into one unified solution. Source: https://rb.gy/ugoqsd #t20mena #Fintech #Bluerails #TreasuryTech #UAE #DigitalPayments

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Numeral has acquired the team behind Ruby Card. Co-founders Shariar Kabir, Jordan Yaqoob, and Miguel Acero have joined Numeral post-acquisition and will work to accelerate their global sales tax and SaaS offerings. The companies first met during Y Combinator’s W23 batch. They became fast friends, given their shared experience building and supporting ecommerce brands. It turned out that Sam Ross wasn’t the only one who had dealt with the nightmare that is sales tax. Today, there are seven YC founders working at Numeral, the leading platform for US and global sales tax compliance. Congrats to the team! https://lnkd.in/ev_jCUv6

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