On the two first days of October, in Istanbul, Turkey, the 6th edition of the Eurasian tech event Webit Congress took place. A large crowd, coming from both Europe and the Arab world, most of them already in town for another Eurasian tech event Startup Istanbul, met at the Haliç Congress Center, on the sunny shores of the Marmara Sea.

The event was marked by the participation of many well known speakers, including about.me founder Tony Conrad, Rahul Sood from Microsoft Ventures, and Justin Kan, the founder of Twitch and Justin TV, and a partner in Y Combinator. The talks were divided into two themes: Leaders of the Future, featuring mostly motivational speeches, and Digital Marketing and Innovation, that dug into new marketing trends in the tech industry.

We met with startups selected to present their products at booths vying to win the Founders Games. Turkey, Ukraine, Bulgaria, Croatia, the UK, France, and other European countries were well represented, but Arab startups didn’t go unnoticed: there were 12 startups representing the Middle East.

Ta3rifah (Egypt/UAE): This SaaS mobile app allows small and medium shops to adapt their offers by analyzing clients’ preferences and consumption habits, while clients can be notified of the offers and discounts relevant to their needs and preferences, and collect loyalty points. The app also offers companies an analysis of their product offer, and of how they might improve their acquisition strategy.

Ta3rifah bills each company monthly depending on how many stores use the service. The startup currently has eight clients in the UAE, mostly restaurants.

The startup, which employs six people and has raised $300,000 USD, came to WebIt to work on their second ongoing $500,000 USD fundraising round. The startup was among the Founders Game finalists, but didn’t win. “We’re not disappointed,” says Ismail Issa, one of the three cofounders. “This is probably the 8th or 9th competition we’ve taken part in, and there will be more.”

Medica Reminders (Egypt): This mobile application enables users to save their medical prescriptions (dosage, frequency, etc.), and to program alerts to ensure they won’t forget to take their drugs, and won’t miss their medical appointments. The startup came to WebIt to raise additional funds and promote the app.

Shablol (Jordan): This Arabic education website offers 7 to 13-year-old kids articles, games, and interactive activities, in both private and moderated forums, from 10 AM to 10 PM (the opening hours of the website). With over 2 million visitors, and 1.3 millions registered users (75% of whom are active) according to founder Jozef El Atrach (pictured above), Shablol is among the most visited websites in Jordan and Egypt.

The startup, which has already raised a total $3 million USD investment, and employs 22 people, was here to convince investors. Shablol left the event with the Founders Games first prize.

Sawerly (Saudi): This platform puts photographers and clients in contact with each other. Clients can check the profile and portfolio of the photographers, as well as previous clients’ feedback, and get a quote or book online. Launched three months ago (although the company graduated as part of Flat6Labs’ first class back in February), the website has already helped 30 people book a photographer. The startup plans on developing other services, including a photo equipment e-store, customized pictures, and more.

Tamatem (Jordan): The video game editor and platform, well familiar to Wamda’s readers, came to meet potential partners, and find new games to publish.

Sufraty (Palestine/Saudi): This app lets users find and share recipes within a community of users. Sufraty has 1,000 users, and although its founders are Paletsinian, it based in Saudi Arabia. Companies can do native advertising, including sponsoring the professional chefs’ own channels, and buy product placement within recipes.

Sufraty recently closed its first fundraising round to develop its marketing.

Kezakoo (Morocco): This collaborative e-learning platform offers video for students from the age of 6 to 23, in both French and Moroccan Arabic. According to cofounder Youssef Ghalem, the site has 25,000 active users, 25% of whom come from Algeria, and feature over 750 videos. Until now, Kezakoo makes money from selling its content to companies and schools; the startup should start monetizing its P2P platform starting next year.

Taking part in Webit allowed the startup to gather user feedback, and to benefit from entrepreneur and investor tips, as well as boost the team’s motivation.

IT flakes (UAE): This software helps dentistry clinics optimize their management. After the UAE, the startup plans on expanding to the US and Canada.

Arab entrepreneurs generally left the event satisfied with the networking they did, especially with investors. The presence of these promising Arab entrepreneurs at this event is even more evidence of MENA entrepreneurs’ desire to expand globally, and of the need to facilitate opportunities to connect them with the global ecosystem.

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Sawerly, the online marketplace that connects photographers and clients, have received a $211,000 from QB Co, an angel investor part of Oqal Angel Investment network. 

Bridging a gap

Some professionals, in this case photographers, find it hard to market their services despite their talents. Sawerly, the first of its kind in the Kingdom, works through an integrated innovative platform that links photographers with clients. Service seekers can receive different offers and quotations from a wide range of photographers and filter them by price, quality, and reviews. 

Sawerly’s around 500 photographers cover events, parties, real estate, special occasions, commercials, YouTube, and others. To book a photographer, customers can either go through the web, or the Android and iOS apps, and then enter their request, specifying the time, place, budget, and event type. The order is then sent to all photographers specialized in the relevant field. Every photographer has a profile that features their work, experience, and reviews from others. Clients make payments online. 

Founded by Hussein Attar, Mohammed Al Zahrani, and Bassam Seif, Sawerly was born out of a Startup Weekend Jeddah competition in 2013. Watch Rayan Adil’s interview with Attar at ArabNet Riyadh here.

“Only 10 teams are selected to pitch their idea in front of a jury for a chance to win a 75,000 SAR prize,” Attar said. During the event, he voted for Mohammed Al Zahrani and Bassam Seif who pitched the idea of Sawerly. “They had an idea related to photography but it wasn’t very clear yet. I didn’t know them before the event. I just liked their idea and was the only one who voted for it.” The Startup Weekend selection committee chose their project, and the three partners worked on developing it and pitching it in front of the jury. 

After pitching, they then applied to Flat6Labs under the management of Qotuf, and despite applying after the deadline they still managed to get an interview. After their project was incubated by Flat6Labs, they took part in a one-week workshop, then graduated along with five other companies.

Hussein Attar, one of Sawerly’s cofounders 

Getting started

According to Attar, Sawerly has so far received more than 180 orders and generated more than 150,000 SAR for photographers. “We have participated in many competitions and pitched Sawerly to a number of investors,” says the cofounder. With their newly announced investment, the cofounders are now looking to hire two Saudi women, as well as attract more talented photographers from the region.

When talking about challenges the team faced at launch, Attar admits that it was hard to market his idea and attract talent. “Most of [the team] only work with us part-time to keep their jobs at big companies.” Another challenge they have faced was finding an investor who would be interested in funding a technical project. Most investments, according to him, go to fields such as real estate and contracting. “They don’t see the benefit of investing in online projects: more return on investment, lower operating expenses, and high ability to expand.”

Having won several awards, Sawery is not without its supporters. The startup won second place at ArabNet Riyadh 2013’s Hackathon, first place at ArabNet Riyadh 2014’s Startup Demo competition, the ‘Get in the Ring’ competition, and most recently Attar was listed in Forbes Middle East’s ‘Leaders Inspiring a Kingdom: Saudi Arabia’s Entrepreneurial Elite’ list, in the technology field.

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Last week, for the third time, Riyadh played host to ArabNet, one of the largest digital technology conferences in Saudi Arabia, featuring 80 speakers and more than 800 digital technology followers from all over the world.

For the first time Design + Code day was on the agenda, drawing more than 200 programmers and designers in 14 workshops. Many tech figures were present to share their tips and expectations about the digital sector’s current trends, such as Dave McClure, the founder of incubator 500 Startups.

In a traditional thobe and ghutra, Omar Christidis, ArabNet’s founder and CEO, inaugurated the conference, making a point that online shopping in Saudi Arabia is seeing an unprecedented growth in a market that is considered the largest in the Arab world (it constitutes for 40% of the regional online shopping market). Christidis also announced at the end of his welcome speech the launch of ArabNet’s new website interface.

Topics on the panels varied between an overview of new trends and introductions to entrepreneurship, startups, entertainment and video content.

Increase in Saudi startups

Previous ArabNets have created a platform for Saudi startups to launch, says Nawaf Al Sahhaf, CEO of Badir Program for Technology Incubators, and a connection channel between experts and entrepreneurs. Al Sahhaf also seized the opportunity to inaugurate his new Soft-Landing Program, which aims at attracting innovative startups from outside Saudi Arabia. 

Regarding investing in startups, most attendees agreed during the discussion panels that more effort should be put into providing organized and specialized funding for companies, as well as into distinguishing between small startups and large corporations.

“We don’t have a fund distribution channel like in the United States or even the United Arab Emirates, which have similar initiatives,” said Khalid Suleimani, Head of Venture Capital at Alkhabeer Capital.He added: “No doubt the government offers big support to the entrepreneurship and startup sector. However, there are many actors and the efforts are scattered, which weakens their impact on the market.”

Ghazi Al Shahrani, Assistant Director General of SMEs in Saudi Credit & Savings Bank, urged entrepreneurs to “focus on the first and most important idea which is hard work and determination.” As for Yasser Mosfer, member of the Board of Directors at Oqal, he said that revenues are proportionally related to the idea itself. “The better the project, the more money and investment it will get you.”

 Testing Oculus for the first time in Saudi Arabia  

Among the new trends highlighted in the summit were virtual reality devices. Oculus headset, which was acquired by Facebook back in March for $2 billion USD, was in the spotlight, and it was tested for the first time in Saudi Arabia. In a talk with Firnas, Jonathan Labin, head of Middle East and Africa at Facebook, assured that Oculus virtual reality headset will be officially launched in the coming four months.

Watch the Oculus testing video here:

Targeting moments, not markets

Parminder Singh, Managing Director of Twitter in Southeast Asia, India and the Middle East and North Africa, delivered a welcome remark in which he mentioned that companies do not target a specific market, but rather important moments, because those are the ones that give their products real value. “Social networks are about people only, and not about brands. The most important thing you can do to build and spread your brand is to target important moments,” he added. An example of targeting moments would be Samsung’s marketing campaign which was inspired by the famous ‘Oscar selfie’. To promote its smartphones, Samsung invited people to take selfies with their loved ones and upload them.

Dave McClure, who surprised the attendees with his traditional Saudi costume, had a strong presence in the conference during which he mentioned that Silicon Valley “isn’t a place, it’s a way of thinking,” assuring that entrepreneurs “don’t need connections to start your business, you need an internet connection.” 

Online games and videos popularity

The “online games and videos popularity” panel was one of the most popular sessions during the conference, in which Jamil Turkistani from Saudi Gamer and Fahad Al Timsah from IPlayAwayIparticipated. 

Fahad talked about his YouTube channel which he started as a hobby, and then later became one that has around half a million subscribers, posting 3 to 4 episodes per week. The average age of its channel audience is 8 to 20 years, which is different from the average age of Saudi Gamer’s audience (15 to 25 years). This can be attributed to the fact that the latter broadcasts serious shows on the history of gaming, according to Jamil, co-founder of Saudi Gamer. 

Malik Nejer, Lumink’s founder, revealed in the “Brand Management” panel that there is not a big enough market for cartoon in the Arab world and that the difference in the types and storytelling of online videos from those airing on TV is something new and different that has made them attract even more viewers, while Kaswara El Khatib, chairman of UTURN added that action, sarcasm, and humor are among the factors that have led to the spread of YouTube videos.

The winner of this year’s Startup Competition was photography website Sawerly, incidentally winner of second place at last year’s Ideathon competition.

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