Buoyed by a sizable investment round in early July, B2B ecommerce platform maxab benefits is expanding its reach across the MENA region. This expansion follows the company’s recent acquisition of Morocco-based WaystoCap.
The startup democratizes the food and spice market by directly connecting retailers to suppliers through a digital marketplace. It offers them a range of value-added services, including real-time demand monitoring and inventory optimization.
Benefits for retailers
MaxAB is the largest Egyptian B2B e-commerce platform that connects food and grocery retailers with suppliers. The startup says it has served 55,000 retailers and processed more than 1 million orders, and is growing at a rate of five times year-on-year. The company also provides a number of business intelligence tools, and it has recently launched an embedded finance vertical.
In addition to enabling retailers to get better pricing and access credit, the platform helps them avoid stocking slow-moving products, thereby saving them money. In turn, this helps suppliers boost sales and increase their brand exposure to new customers.
Last year, MaxAB raised $6.2m in a seed round that was one of the largest for a Middle Eastern startup. The round was led by RMBV, which manages institutional private equity funds focused on North Africa. Its recent acquisition of Morocco-based WaystoCap demonstrates that the startup is on track to become the leading regional B2B eCommerce platform for food and grocery retail and FMCG suppliers.
Benefits for suppliers
MaxAB aims to disrupt the supply-chain management of Egypt’s traditional retailers (mom-and-pop shops) by shortening and bringing transparency to their procurement processes. It offers them a one-stop supplier with transparent pricing, on-demand delivery and embedded finance solutions.
This helps them save time and money by avoiding the need to go through multiple intermediaries. In addition, it enables suppliers to make more informed decisions by having access to data points such as market shares and demand for specific SKUs on a district level.
The acquisition of Morocco-based B2B e-commerce and distribution platform WaystoCap is the first step in this direction, positioning MaxAB as a leading food and grocery e-commerce business that can serve the whole of North Africa. It will also enable the company to scale recently launched business lines such as embedded finance and a broadening of its supply-chain solutions. The $40 million equity round was led by RMBV with participation from existing investors including International Finance Corp, Flourish Ventures, Rise Capital and Endeavor Catalyst.
Benefits for consumers
Founded in 2018, MaxAB connects food and grocery retailers with suppliers using an Android app. It provides retailers with a range of benefits including price transparency, the ability to order stock online, and access to credit. In addition, it also helps brands predict demand and prevents them from overstocking slow-moving goods.
Earlier this month, MaxAB announced a $40 million pre-series B equity round to support its expansion across the MENA region. This investment was led by Silver Lake and the British International Investment, as well as existing investors Beco Capital, 4DX Ventures, and Flourish Ventures. It will allow MaxAB to bring more value to traditional small-scale retailers in one of Africa’s largest economies. MaxAB will also be able to provide them with embedded finance solutions, which will help them digitize their cash flow and improve their efficiency. The company’s vision is to reach half of Egypt’s population by 2023. They will achieve this by expanding into Morocco and integrating with the national distribution network.
Benefits for employees
MaxAB operates a B2B e-commerce platform that connects retailers with suppliers. It was founded in 2018 and is based in Cairo, Egypt. The company is backed by Flourish Ventures and RMBV. It has been included in two Analyst Expert Collections, which highlight the most promising tech companies in supply chain & logistics.
It serves more than 55,000 retailers, processes over a million orders, and has created 1,600 jobs in the past three years. It has also grown more than fivefold year-on-year. El-Megharbel believes that MENA is the new Southeast Asia for entrepreneurs, with its relatively young population, growing access to capital, and digitization initiatives catalyzing growth in tech startups.
Employees who purchase maxab benefits can choose from a wide range of lifestyle products, including drug coverage, health spending accounts, and dental, critical illness, disability, and life insurance. These packages are administered by Canada’s leading third-party administrator (TPA) for small and medium-sized businesses.