Careem, one of Uber’s rivals in the Middle East, has taken in $350 million in investment led by Japanese e-commerce firm Rakuten and Saudi Telecom Company (STC), the second investment made by Saudi Arabia’s government into ride-sharing apps this year. Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) invested $3.5 billion in ride-hailing app Uber in June,
STC has approved the purchase of a ten-percent stake in Careem, the Middle East’s answer to Uber, to the tune of $100 million, with Rakuten injecting $250 million into the company. Bloomberg reports that STC is already an investor in Careem through its venture capital arm, STC Ventures, citing Careem’s website.
Investors in Careem.
Investors in Careem’s earlier funding rounds include Dubai-based Wamda Capital and Saudi Arabia’s Al Tayyar Travel Group. Careem’s CEO and Co-Founder, Mudassir Sheikha, spent a decade in Silicon Valley before becoming a management consultant in the region, according to Careem’s website.
Those investments give the four-year-old, Dubai-based company a valuation of about $1 billion.
The investments form part of the Saudi Arabia’s strategy to take stakes in overseas technology companies as it diversifies its assets as part of the Kingdom’s Vision 2030 and National Transformation Program.
