Tech in Africa
Telda, an Egypt-based digital banking service fintech has successfully raised a $5 million pre-seed round led by Sequoia Capital, with participation from Class 5 Global and Global Founders Capital. This marks Sequoia Capital’s first investment in the MENA region.
Telda is a digital banking service that caters to millennials and Gen Z. Users can set up their own accounts using their national IDs and phone numbers. Your Telda account comes with a Mastercard-powered card that helps in making online payments, cash withdrawals, and in-store payments. Telda users can receive their money from any part of Egypt or overseas provided they use the IBAN number on their digital account. In its first month of operation, the startup has seen an impressive 30,000 sign-ups.
The complete digital approach is not too different from UK startups Monzo and Starling, which are also digital banks only accessible from mobile apps with no brick-and-mortar premises.
The fintech startup was founded last month by CEO Ahmed Sabbah (the former CTO and co-founder of Swvl), Youssef Sholqamy, a former senior engineer at Uber.
In a statement, Ahmed referred to Telda as Egypt’s “first digital banking experience” helping customers create their accounts in a matter of seconds. He went further to describe the digitized process of sending and receiving money as “easy as sending a Whatsapp message.”
Youssef Sholqamy, Telda’s CTO described the new funding milestone as a way of promoting the digital transformation” of Egypt’s economy while providing access to “important financial services.”
George Robson, a partner at Sequoia described the parallels between Egypt and Brazil, particularly their “young, talented and tech-savvy population” while confirming that Telda is their investment in the MENA region.
Original article on Wamda
