The World Economic Forum in Marrakech yesterday witnessed some really interesting news from Intel Capital, which announced 3 new investments in the Middle East; UK-Lebanon based Nymgo, as well as Jordanian companies Jeeran and ShooFeeTV.
This investment marks a second round of investment from Intel Capital in both Jeeran and ShooFeeTV (both also IV Holdings portfolio companies), after the previous investment that was announced in May of last year.
The investment in Nymgo also marks Intel Capital’s expansion of its portfolio in the Arab world to a total of eight companies: Nymgo, Jeeran, ShooFeeTV, Conservus, Pulse Technologies, Vertex Animation Studio, NeuString and Sphere Networks.
The size of the investments in the three companies weren’t disclosed (as always in the region), but the investment obviously comes from Intel Capital’s $50 million Middle East and Turkey Fund, which is aimed to assist the companies in pursuing regional growth and development plans in addition to extending their product offerings.
Nymgo, a VoIP services provider launched in 2008 and already boasting over 2 million downloads for their desktop application, will be focusing on accelerating infrastructure deployment, operations enhancement and global marketing.
Jeeran, a web community platform founded back in 2000, aims to use the funds to deploy city portals in each of the major Arab cities across the Middle East, as they have already done with Amman and their Jeeran Amman portal.
ShooFeeTV, a startup founded in 2006 that aggregates Arab satellite TV listings and entertainment related content, will be using the money to enhance their working capital and expand their business model.