COTU Ventures, a Dubai-based early-stage venture capital firm, has marked the final closing of its debut investment vehicle to back startups in the Middle East and North Africa region from pre-seed to seed stages.
The VC firm, which counts the Dubai Future District Fund (DFDF) as a limited partner, raised $54 million in its first outing. It plans to deploy the capital across startups in three focus markets—the UAE, Saudi Arabia, and Egypt.
Besides the DFDF, other key limited partners for the fund include Abu Dhabi-based Lunate, Abu Dhabi sovereign wealth fund Mubadala, Jordan’s Arab Bank, and Bupa Arabia. Other investors in the fund include family offices and general partners from VCs, including Foundry Group, Tribe Capital, and Stride.
COTU, which stands for Champions of the Underdog, was founded by Amir Farha in 2021. Previously, he co-founded VC firm BECO Capital along with Dany Farha in 2012. BECO invested in companies like Careem, Property Finder, and Fresha, in their initial stages.
COTU is a sector-agnostic fund and aims to invest between $500,000 and $1.5 million as a first cheque.
The fund has already backed over 20 startups across the region. These include Egypt-based fintech firm MoneyHash, the UAE-based online mortgage platform Huspy, the UAE-based SaaS platform for restaurants Supy, logistics player Mayple, Pakistani e-commerce company LiveBazaar, Pakistani digital lending platform AdalFi, Saudi on-demand warehousing startup Sirdab, and the UAE-based B2B e-commerce marketplace Kingpin.
