Top 5 Arab Global Startups to Watch in 2012

Top 5 Arab Global Startups to Watch in 2012

Whenever I start talking about global startups from Arabia, I always get these questions: Are there any ones in here? And if there are, can they really compete with international startups?! My answer is always yes and yes!

Arab global startups are rare, that’s a fact. but they always come with great quality, because the people who start them realize that they are facing bigger challenges. And unfortunately, they used to bypass Arab VCs and get investments form other sources. Then, suddenly, we hear about that Arab American whose startup was funded by a US VC or was even acquired!

That’s because most of Arab VCs focus on local/regional startups, which of course I fully support and encourage, because we really lack good Arabic websites and mobile apps. But we also need some other VCs to focus on global ones, which is what we at Sinbad Ventures are focusing on.

In parallel to building good Arabic content, and in parallel to serving Arabic users, we need to start building global startups as well to put ourselves on the map of international players in this industry. I mean we need to start companies that target the international user rather than only the Arabic user.

Although global startups come with higher risk and higher competition, but they also come with higher valuations and higher returns. If we compare the average valuation of a local/regional early-stage startup in the arab world, with the average valuation for a global startup at the same stage in USA, we can see the huge opportunity in there.

I mean, if we as Arab VCs, start to fund Arab global startups, and help them get the next rounds from USA VCs, their valuations will immediately jump to the international levels, and huge returns can be achieved. This is what Sinbad Ventures is all about.

Recently, we’ve seen more Arab startups receiving seed funding from Arab accelerators and seed stage investors such as Flat6Labs and Wamda, which is a good sign of change. We’ve also seen excellent Arab startups going global big time.

Below I am listing the Top 5 Arab Global Startups to Watch for 2012 hoping that they can really make to the next level:

1. Mixed Dimensions (MXD)

Although their website does not look really good, but these Jordanian geeks of Mixed Dimensions (Muhannad and Bahaa) made it to the top of my list because they are tapping into a real blue ocean! They develop tools for platform developers, gaming companies and interactive 3D online and mobile applications developers.

They are now more into Unity based tools and they’re selling their tools and plugins on the Unity Asset Store. Their latest tool, GameDraw, ranked #7 in the top paid tools and extensions on the Unity Asset Store 2012. GameDraw was also selected to be part of a huge Madness Sale online for Unity Developers with an average selling of 50 Licenses weekly!

2. Guided Ways

With a lousy website too! but great apps and great global achievements, comes next the Saudi mobile apps startup: Guided Ways Technologies. Their 2Do App won the Best Ever App Award for Time Management Apps 2009, and the Best App Ever Award for Productivity Apps 2010. If you go to the founder’s blog, Bandar you can find a list of all their global apps on the left. They have lots of Islamic apps, but they also have some really good apps that might replace core apps in the iPhone.

3. Vimov

Third comes the mobile apps startups Vimov from Egypt founded by Amr. Their Weather HD App made it really big and was reviewed by NY Times, PC Magazine, ZDNet and MacWorld.

4. Taktek Games

Fourth comes the Jordanian Taktek Games, a mobile games company with big expectations for their My Marbles game, for which they signed with Angry Birds publisher Chillingo! Founded by Gaith and backed by Hijaz Investments, the company has 25 employees working on two new games to be released end of this year.

5. Kngine

Fifth comes the Egyptian app that that answers your questions! Kngine, founded by Haytham. An amazing new search technology explained in this video. The app responds to voice and text based questions, and is available for iPhone and Android devices.

Worth Mentioning:

• Woopra The Lebanese live analytics startup Woopra, founded by Elie and Jad. Although they are facing really tough competition by Google Analytics, but they’re still surviving! I hope to see their next move soon.
• TwitMail The Saudi TwitMail founded by the active tweep Saleh as an easy way to share emails you receive on Twitter.
• Batoul Apps Founded by the Jordanian American Ameir, Batoul App works closely with Bandar of Guided Ways. They have developed a cool app for Euro 2012 among other Islamic and global apps that can be found on their website.
• Ask Native
• Crowdever
• Qordoba
• Nextly
• Dakwak
• Social Wire
• Scrim

If you know any other Arab Global Startups, please mention them in your comments so I can add them to the list