UAE-based e-commerce enabler Zbooni, has raised a $5 million Series A funding round led by an undisclosed London-based fund.

Founded in 2017, Zbooni enables small merchants to easily start, run and grow their businesses online, providing them with a range of business-focused services, such as mobile invoicing and payment solutions, digital storefronts in its marketplace, data insights, automated sales tracking and invoicing. It initially started out as a chat commerce venture enabling payments via WhatsApp before launching its new e-commerce enablement services, signaling the growing demand for online selling.

Zbooni said that it had recorded a rapid acceleration in 2020, including 600 per cent in customer growth. It currently supports thousands of merchants, processing tens of millions of dirhams every month and has enabled its merchants to serve more than 150,000 customers.

Zbooni will use the funding to grow its team and fuel its expansion across its home market as well as in the Saudi and Jordanian markets.

“Zbooni is on a mission to help provide access to digital commerce tools, ultimately supporting our merchants to start, run and grow their business. While we wish to keep the investor undisclosed, their reputation and track record speaks for itself, they have previously invested in some of the most successful emerging market growth stories - operating a fund of well over $1billion in assets under management. Through this support, Zbooni will invest in people to develop even better products for our merchants and enhance the customer experience with best-in-class technology,” said Ramy Assaf, Zbooni CEO and co-founder.

The company was incubated at Facebook, the world’s largest social media network, and is backed by regional and international organisations, including Chalhoub Group, Middle East Venture Partners and B&Y Venture Capital.

“Our customers are the real heroes of this story, and we’re just scratching the surface of what we’re able to help them do,” said Assaf. “We believe there remain millions of SMEs still left severely underserved across our geographies – we are here for them.”