Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region’s MEVP has invested in Wego, in exchange for an equity ownership alongside MBC Group (Middle East Broadcasting Centre), which had announced the deal with Wego in July.
MEVP aims to reinforce and expand Wego’s regional footprint for the Singapore founded and now dual-headquartered in Dubai and Singapore firm.
“With Wego’s rapid MENA expansion we decided to seek out smart investors from the region who have deep experience and connections and in MEVP we’ve definitely found that and more,” commented Ross Veitch, Wego CEO & Co-Founder. “I welcome the MEVP investment and I look forward to working with the team at MEVP as we develop Wego’s business across the MENA region.”
Wego entered into MENA by launching a fully localized experience just in time to meet the demand from a new generation of travelers wanting to shop for and book flights and hotels on their smartphones. Wego quickly grew to become the most popular and trusted travel comparison service in the region with over 10 million monthly visits by collaborating with over 700 local and global airlines, hotels and online travel agents.
MEVP is the pioneer and largest VC firm in the MENA region with offices in Dubai and Beirut. MEVP recently announced an investment by Mohamed Alabbar, Founder & Chairman of Emaar Properties, into MEVP.
MEVP joins existing Wego investors including Tiger Global Management, Crescent Point Group and Square Peg Capital. Dubai-based investment bank Arqaam Capital helped facilitate this transaction.
Walid Hanna, MEVP Founder and CEO, added, “Online travel in MENA is a large vertical and continues to grow rapidly aided by a shift in consumer behavior from offline to online. Wego is capitalizing on such favorable market dynamics and is already a leading travel brand that is highly recognized by travelers in the region, especially Saudi Arabia. We are also pleased to have media giant MBC onboard as a strategic partner with whom we have had three other successful partnerships on other platforms. Wego has an exciting growth plan and with the support of MBC and MEVP, we believe it is well positioned to dominate the travel metasearch play in MENA.”
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