RIYADH: Noon.com, a Middle Eastern rival to Amazon plans to raise up to $2 billion over the next three to four years from Saudi sovereign fund PIF and other investors, to capture a larger slice of the Gulf e-commerce market.
The money will be used to upgrade infrastructure and help speed up deliveries, Noon founder Mohamed Alabbaron Sunday told Bloomberg on Sunday.
E-commerce currently accounts for 2 to 2.5 percent of total retail in the region, compared with 20 to 22 percent in the western world and China, he said.
Noon operates in the UAE, Ƶ and Egypt and is looking to expand in other nations across the Middle East.
Alabbar, who owns 50 percent of Noon jointly with other regional private investors, raised $1 billion from backers including the PIF to create the firm in 2016. It now has about 4 million daily users and growth is accelerating as it pushes into grocery delivery.
“Traffic is growing on a monthly basis,” Alabbar said. “We’re easily doubling every year and the volume of package delivery is up almost 2.5 times.”
