Souq.com the regions largest e-commerce website of the current White Friday fame, were in talks to sell a minority stake, however that has now become an outright buy from American e-commerce giants Amazon. The company secured $275 million from investors after Tiger Global and Naspers. The valuation is significant and would make it the largest Dubai based start-up exit. 

The Dubai based company has over 3,000 employees and sells more than 150m goods across the region per annum

Amazon getting a foothold in the middle east

Ecommerce has been slow to catch on in the Middle East and North Africa, and global players and thus far shunned the region. However, this move by Amazon would give it a strong foothold in a growing market. 

Is Souq.com really worth $1 billion

To put it in perspective, when Alibaba, the largest e-commerce platform in China, IPO’s last year, in had a valuation of $60 billion. 

This would be a very positive outcome…

For Souq.com, it’s founders, those who invested but it would also give the start-up ecosystem in Dubai a boost after what has been a though economic year at a macro level, but also within the startup ecosystem. This ‘exit’ would give confidence to existing startups, those looking to enter the startup pace and also to investors and we move towards 2017. 

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