Propeller, a Jordan-based early-stage VC, announces the first close of Propeller Ventures II. The new fund will invest in pre-seed and seed-stage startups in Jordan and other MENA countries. The fund is sector agnostic but will favour investments in software and technology startups — such as SaaS and cloud infrastructure startups — over tech-enabled solutions. Propeller aims to reach a final close of $15M within the upcoming year.
Propeller Ventures II's limited partners include the Innovative Startups and SMEs Fund (ISSF), Capital Bank of Jordan, BeyondCapital, and several individual investors including startup founders and an ex-Careemer.
“The ISSF is extremely excited to have concluded an investment in Propeller Ventures II. Our excitement stems from the fact that Propeller provides the startups they invest in with real-world and practical mentoring, enabling investee companies to better navigate the chaotic waters of starting and growing successful businesses. We see Propeller’s proactive coaching as a great added value, particularly since its principals are themselves successful entrepreneurs who are intimately familiar with the challenges of establishing and expanding thriving businesses,” commented Laith Al Qasem, CEO at the ISSF.
Propeller was founded by Tambi Jalouqa and Zaid Al-Farekh in 2017 with the backing of early-investor and partner AbdulMajeed Shoman and others. They set out to back and support visionary founders during the turmoil early days of product and company building. Since then Propeller has invested in a total of 13 early-stage startups and were the first backers of Arabot, POSRocket and Nestrom.
The firm's founding is deeply-rooted in the partners' passion for software and belief in the transformative power of technology. Both Tambi and Zaid come from software engineering backgrounds and have over 30 years of combined experience in building technology products and companies.
Tamer Salah, Managing Director of BeyondCapital, said "At the heart of Propeller is a team of builders and founders themselves. We believe in this dynamic team; fully capable of building and guiding a portfolio of competitive technology startups. A proven synergy lies between Propeller and BeyondCapital’s core values and overall mission in its value add to Jordan. We are eager to watch Propeller’s story unroll and are proud to be a source of support for them."
"We seek founders who are obsessed about their customers and follow their lead. Our experience in building products and teams gives us the strength to empower them to satisfy those customers," commented Tambi Jalouqa, Managing Partner at Propeller.
With a focus on software and technology, Propeller is betting hard on the builders of our region and are already leading several initiatives to enrich and advance the software community — that is the software engineers, product managers, designers, and anyone building tech products.
In 2019, Propeller held their first international software development conference, Xpand Conference. The 2-day conference brought together around 500 software professionals eager to learn the latest global practices and advancements in the field of software development from international subject-matter experts. The vibrant atmosphere at Xpand 2019 was a testament to the builder community's passion and hunger for growth, which is what Propeller is betting on to create the wealth of this region's future.
Today, Propeller also produces 2 talk shows — one for founders and product people, Let's Talk Product, and another for software engineers, Xpand Snippets.
With this new fund Propeller will continue working towards their mission of enabling Middle East's top innovators to build technology companies that deliver value to the world. Tambi Jalouqa commented, "We are confident that there are founders in the region who are itching to build products for global consumers, and we want to be there to back them."
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