Growth-stage companies in Mena face $20 billion funding gap

Growth-stage companies in Mena face $20 billion funding gap

Growth-stage funding in the Middle East and North Africa region (Mena) faces a $20 billion gap, with only $4.2 billion VC dry powder available, according to a report by Saudi VC firm Saudi Technology Ventures (STV)

Based on a previous report by STV, the Mena region is expected to create 40 unicorns by 2030, requiring a total of $10.8 billion in funding. This data stacks up against a global benchmark, which sets the financing requirements to produce a unicorn at $270 million in funding. With a 40 per cent success rate for growth-stage companies raising much larger rounds, as further expected by STV, $25 billion in funding is needed to support the development of growth-stage companies.

VC-backed growth-stage companies need to have tenfold the amount of capital needed by their early-stage counterparts. The scarcity of funding allocated to growth-stage companies requires the presence of at least 10 VC funds dedicated to late-stage funding in the market, the STV report suggests.