Egypt and MENA-based e-commerce platform, Kenzz, has secured $3.5 million in seed capital led by Outliers Venture Capital, a venture capital firm with a focus on the MENA region.

Other participants include Samurai Incubate, Foundation Ventures, and HOF Capital.

Kenzz was founded by Ahmed Atef, Mahmoud Al Silk, and Moataz Sami in February 2022. The startup also plans to use the seed round to expand its product categories, attract talent, and make technology investments before launching its app.

The founders contend that Egypt’s high rates of internet usage and purchasing conceal the fact that e-commerce in Egypt and the wider MENA area has not yet been completely fulfilled and optimised. Atef, the CEO, says that the platform was founded to make it easier for people in Egypt to do business online.

Online shoppers in Egypt typically make purchases on major e-commerce sites like Souq, which will become Amazon Egypt in 2021, Jumia, and Noon or social commerce sites that operate in a B2B2C fashion and use Facebook pages and groups.

Both business models have succeeded in boosting e-commerce in Egypt, but according to Atef, the major online retailers ignore the mass market in favour of concentrating their efforts in Egypt’s three largest cities, Cairo, Alexandria, and Giza, while smaller social media platforms frequently offer untrusted and disorganised services.

Therefore, Kenzz was developed to make up for the shortcomings of the two models by making items accessible to the general public and providing them in a structured way.

READ ALSO - B2B Trucking Startup Trella Secures Additional $6m in Debt Funding

Atef also said that the Kenzz model helps local manufacturers and small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) by giving them access to customers and information about what they want.

In order to satisfy customer requirements, Kenzz is currently fine-tuning its products. According to Atef, the platform’s two-month soft launch saw tremendous customer demand. He claimed that thousands of clients used the platform during this period, with 50% of them placing orders outside of Egypt’s major cities.

These figures support the idea that there is a huge market for online sales in major cities. But you can tap into this huge potential when your brand's products, prices, and experiences are so relevant to them.

Sarah AlSaleh, Partner at Outliers Venture Capital, stated in a release that the asset-light Kenzz is addressing two important problems that current e-commerce incumbents are not addressing: inexpensive and dependable last-mile logistics and an unwavering consumer trust philosophy.

She says that the founding team's years of experience from Vodafone, Google, Amazon, and Jumia are one reason why Outliers invested in Kenzz.

The partner said that the diversity and depth of Kenzz's founding team "strongly positioned them to combine a wide range of experiences and skills to create a category-defining brand and e-commerce champion for Egypt."