middle-east-fintech
(2)
Wafeq وافِق
Wafeq is a cloud accounting and e-invoicing platform built for small and medium businesses across Saudi Arabia and the UAE. Founded in 2019 by Nadim Alameddine, it gives SMEs and accounting firms ZATCA- and FTA-compliant invoicing, VAT and corporate tax reporting, payroll, inventory, and 40+ financial reports in one Arabic-and-English interface. The platform processes roughly 2 million invoices worth about $400 million every month and serves more than 10,000 customers, with the vast majority of activity in Saudi Arabia.
YAP
YAP is a Dubai-based digital banking platform that lets people open an account, get an instant IBAN and Mastercard, send and receive money, pay bills and track spending entirely from a mobile app. Launched in March 2021 as the UAE's first independent digital banking platform, YAP does not hold its own banking licence in the UAE; instead it partners with licensed banks (originally RAKBANK) to provide the underlying accounts while YAP builds the customer-facing experience, analytics and card controls. The company has raised roughly $41 million and is expanding across the Middle East, Africa and South Asia, targeting Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan and Ghana.