Nawy, a Cairo-based property-technology start-up, has secured a seven-figure investment in a seed round led by the Sawiris Family Office. The investment round also saw the participation of the CEO of the Etisalat Group, Hatem Dowidar.
Founded in 2016 under the brand name ‘Cooing’ by Mohamed Abou Ghanima, Abdel-Azim Osman, Ahmed Rafea, Aly Rafea and Mostafa El Beltagy, Nawy provides an end-to-end platform for users to browse real estate properties located across Egypt.
With the latest funds, Nawy plans to invest in their technology and to diversify their model to accommodate for a wider array of services. At the moment, Nawy allows users to run elaborate searches for property through its platform. Users are able to filter their searches down to property size, price, location and more. Once a user has found a property they are interested in, Nawy’s brokerage arm steps in to provide a seamless transaction process at no additional cost to the user.
“There’s a considerable chunk of time lost from a home-buyer’s end due to the lack of information and transparency, which breeds anxiety within customers. Even more traditional methods, such as push sales from cold calling, are leaving customers more skeptical than ever,” explained Nawy’s CEO Mostafa El Beltagy in a statement.
“Nawy is vying to become the leading real estate search engine and platform equipping customers with all the information and insight they need to select a home in Egypt’s top gated communities. This is enabled by our fully integrated model which includes the strongest client service/sales team aiming to serve the customer’s needs, our in-house technology, and seasoned experts and consultants in the real estate domain.”
Onsi Sawiris, the head of the Sawiris Family Office, meanwhile believes that Nawy is paving the way for the evolution of service offerings in the property sector in Egypt.
“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 Sawiris in a statement.
“Nawy has paved the way for it to be manifested and realized, and I am in full belief of their vision’s viability. Nawy has checked all the quintessential boxes from acquiring the right team and talent to ensuring their backend is a truly inventive one that is able to deliver a seamless and transparent home-buyer’s journey.”
To date, Nawy has connected 30,000 people to their properties in Egypt, facilitating the sale of more than EGP 1 billion in properties. In a statement, Nawy said that despite a turbulent year in Egypt’s real estate sector fuelled by the COVID-19 pandemic, Nawy is still on its path to reach 300 percent growth in 2021.
Nawy isn’t the first ‘property technology’ start-up in the region. Competitors include Aqarmap, which was first founded in 2011 in Yemen and has offices in Egypt, and Bayut, which claims to be the UAE’s largest real estate portal.
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