Middle East Ventures » Podcast

YEA – Jordan: Fostering a Culture of Entrepreneurship

MEVentures — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 13:38:29 +0000

Founded in 1997, The Young Entrepreneurs Association (YEA) of Jordan is a rare organization both in Jordan and the Middle East. The organization exists to encourage and develop a culture of entrepreneurship in Jordan, and support and mentor entrepreneurs. As the organization recognizes entrepreneurship is far removed from the day-to-day culture of Jordan and it hopes to remedy this:

Entrepreneurship has not been part of the Jordanian business culture although 70 percent of the Jordanian population is less than 30 years of age representing vast untapped economic resources. Thus, a new business mentality and new generation of entrepreneurs beyond the traditional inherited business philosophy of local industries is needed in order to claim a greater share of the regional and international export markets.

Chances are that if you are a tech. entrepreneur in Jordan you’re a member of YEA. The organization is supported by its members and corporate sponsors including: King Abdullah II Fund for Development, Aramex, Naouri Group, Jordan Kuwait Bank, Primus, Zain, and the One Global Economy Corporation.

I had a chance to sit down with Nour Kabariti, the Executive Director of YEA. There are few people that are as committed and passionate about improving and making Jordan better than Nour. She’s an unsung hero in the development of Jordanian business.

Our conversation follows below:

Interview with Nour Kabariti – YEA.mp3

Maktoob.com: “This is Only the Beginning”

MEVentures — Thu, 27 Sep 2007 21:43:38 +0000

Founded in 1998, as a free e-mail service in the Arabic language, Maktoob.com is now the juggernaut of consumer internet sites in the Middle East through its portal. The Company boasts that it is “the world’s largest Arab online community” – which is accurate.

The Maktoob.com portal is held by the aptly named Maktoob Group, which also owns the following internet properties: Bentehalal.com – a matrimonial site, Sport4ever.com – a sports oriented online community, Araby.com – “the first Arabic search engine”, Souq.com – an eBay for the Middle East, and CashU – a PayPal-esque site for the region.

Of all the startups in the region, Maktoob has certainly received more media attention that any else, both locally and abroad. In part this has to due to Maktoob’s age; it was one of the earliest internet sites catering to the Middle East and has seen its share of ups and downs in the global internet life cycle. Samih Toukan, CEO of Maktoob, still refers to this time as the beginning for Maktoob, which then begs the question where is the end?

Maktoob has been profitable for quite some time and given its age, it’s lived the average of two startups in Silicon Valley. It remains to be seen what the exit will be for Maktoob’s investors. IPO’ing is not really in the picture, either regionally or in Europe or America, so that leaves open the door to getting acquired and that’s about it. If and when Maktoob has a liquidity event will not only be good for Maktoon and its investors, but could be the first tech. startup success story in a region where if you have some extra money lying around you invest in real estate.

To date, Maktoob has been backed by EFG Hermes (~$2.5mm), Abraaj Capital ($5.2mm) and Tiger Global ($5.25mm).

I had a chance to chat with Samih Toukan, CEO of Maktoob. The conversation follows below:
Part 1: The Technology Environment in the Middle East
Part 1.mp3

Part 2: Running a Startup in Jordan
Part 2.mp3

QRCE: Creating a Culture of Entrepreneurship

MEVentures — Fri, 21 Sep 2007 14:52:28 +0000

Founded in 2003, The Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship based at the Princess Sumaya University for Technology exists to promote tech. based entrepreneurship in Jordan, in that regards it’s the only center of its kind in the country and perhaps within the region (with the notable exception of Israel). There is a nascent culture of tech. based entrepreneurship in Jordan and it needs all the help it can get.

The Center has four established programs: 1) the Technology Commercialization Program, which hopes to patent and license IP; 2) the Queen Rania National Entrepreneurship Competition, a business case competition for budding entrepreneurs throughout Jordan (the most visible of the four); 3) Connect Jordan, a networking organization; and 4) DART (Dream, Aim, Reach and Target), an entrepreneurship society for students. The Center is sponsored by the Jordan Telecom Group, The National Fund for Enterprise Support (Nafes), and Jordan Business.

Officially:

Established in 1991, the Princess Sumaya University for Technology (PSUT) is a specialized nonprofit ICT Jordanian university. In the year 2003, PSUT embarked on a vigorous development and expansion plan. An integral part of the plan was the establishment of an Entrepreneurship Center that would be located at the heart of Jordan’s scientific, academic and R&D corridor. The idea was to name the Center after a prominent Arab dignitary known for his/her distinguished role in supporting economic growth and entrepreneurship. Thus, work towards launching the Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship (QRCE) started in October 2004.

The center aims at national development and planned to be the regions’ corner stone for technology commercialization and entrepreneurship advancement. The QRCE targets university students, researchers, innovators, entrepreneurs and others. According to PSUT’s development plan, the next step will be the establishment of a business school to be linked to the center.

Working closely with local and international organizations; the QRCE will focus on issues such as: capacity building, consulting, counseling and developing the local “Entrepreneurial Personality & Spirit”. Furthermore, the QRCE will actively work on extending the intellectual wealth of Jordan while maintaining strong links with the business community in general.

Thus far, the Center has been known for its case competition which has helped launched: Faye3.com, which calls itself “the first Arabic Social Network in the world with an Arabic taste;” and Ketab Technologies, a developer of tech. focused education solutions (their first product is an electronic white-board). Both companies were winner of the case competition.

I had a chance to sit down with Basel Kilany, Acting Director, and Mohammad Khawaja, Project Manager, at the QRCE.

QRCE Podcast:
The QRCE.mp3

Jeeran.com: Building an Online Arab Community

MEVentures — Mon, 17 Sep 2007 10:51:00 +0000

Started in 2000 as a web-hosting service for the Middle East, Jeeran.com has evolved to provide a blogging platform, photo sharing and will soon begin offering video-sharing. The Company recently took funding from Accelerator Technology Holdings, the Jordan based tech. holding company, rumored to be around $1mm.

Jeeran.com currently hosts approximately +570,000 websites and blogs, and is keenly focused in building and growing its online community.

I had a chance to sit down with Laith Zraikat, co-founder of Jeeran. The conversation can be heard below.

Jeeran Statistics:

Part 1: The Technology Environment in the Middle East
Part 1.mp3

Part 2: Running a Startup in Jordan
Part 2.mp3

Akhtaboot.com: Creating a Career Network

MEVentures — Mon, 10 Sep 2007 16:36:00 +0000

With an official unemployment rate of 15.4% and an unofficial unemployment rate ~30% there’s no shortage of job seekers in Jordan (figures from here). To date, there are only two ways to find gainful employment in Jordan – 1) go through your friends and family; 2) knock door-to-door and hand out your resume. Aside from these two routes, there really is no other way of obtaining employment. A nearly non-existent third route, and for that reason not included in the first two categories, is by replying to job advertisements in newspapers. Clearly, this is a major pain point. Akhtaboot.com hopes to address this issue by providing an online community of job seekers and employers. (You can read their mission statement here. The Company is marketing themselves as a Web 2.0 company and have the logo and AJAX to feel at home with the myriad other “Web 2.0″ startups. If you thought the logo is pretty neat, it was unsurprisingly designed by SYNTAX Digital, Ahmad Humeid’s company.)

Akhtaboot.com is not the first company to begin addressing the online job market in the Middle East. Bayt.com has been doing so for quite sometime and is the undisputed leader in the field in the Middle East. Akhtaboot.com is currently focusing primarily on the Jordanian market and hopes to expand in the region over time. The Company’s business model focuses on two revenue streams: 1) Paid job listings (posted by employers); and 2) Online resume searches. Both of which revolve around potential employers posting job listings and searching for potential employees. The Company is heavily marketing itself in Jordan through radio and and online advertising, mainly through Google Ads and they now also appear on Facebook.

The pricing structure is as follows:

The Company was co-founded by Yousef Shamoun, a graduate of McGill University with an MBA from Georgetown. I had a chance to sit down with him and discuss the tech. startup environment in Jordan and the Middle East, and his plans for Akhtaboot.com

Part 1: The Technology Environment in the Middle East
Part1.mp3

Part 2: Running a Startup in Jordan
Part2.mp3

Mecca.com: A Portal for the Muslim Ummah

MEVentures — Sun, 09 Sep 2007 13:14:28 +0000

Launched to the public a few weeks ago, mecca.com, aims to be the portal of choice for Muslims online. Headquartered in Amman, Jordan, the Company was founded by Ibrahim Al-Husseini and has Sami Al-Taher as its CEO. Both of whom have spent considerable time working in technology and were educated abroad.

Mecca.com, estimates that there are “approximately 28mm” Muslims online the Middle East” and “about 100mm Muslims globally.” (There are an estimated 1.4bn Muslim globally.) The Company hopes to develop “the mecca.com website as a prestige online service and destination, with offerings related to the city of Mecca, Muslim identity, and travel.”

The home page isn’t all that much as of now, and unlike other portals in the Middle East, e.g. maktoob.com, will not give you access to any features till you register for membership. This will clearly limit their membership base as there is no compelling reason to register, unless you want a mecca.com email address.

In bolstering its visibility in the Muslim world, the site was briefly affiliated with Reza Aslan, but is no longer.

You can listen to the podcast below.

Part 1: Technology Businesses in Jordan and the Middle East
Part1.mp3

Part 2: Mecca.com
Part2.mp3