Riyadh-based software as a service (SaaS) start-up OTO has just completed a $3 million funding round from MEVP and Derayah Capital.
In what is the largest seed round raised by a SaaS company in the MENA region, the funding will be used to grow the company’s customer base across the GCC and Egypt, while also working to create new products and features.
OTO is an all-in-one shipping management software for ecommerce businesses and omnichannel retailers, helping brands ship, manage, track, and return their online orders with over 100 shipping carriers via one single dashboard.
Co-founder and CEO, Mohammad Al-Razaz, said: “The e-commerce industry is growing rapidly, especially in the GCC where it is expected to hit $50 billion by 2025. However, moving towards e-commerce is not as easy as it sounds, since most of the online businesses are struggling from the manual operational processes when it comes into shipping, starting from using multiple carriers’ dashboards to downloading excel sheets to analyse the performance of the shipping carriers.
“On the other hand, 57 percent of GCC consumers expect their online orders to be delivered within 2 – 24 hours. Indeed, 7 out of 10 of the online orders abandon their shopping cart mainly from the high shipping fees and late delivery times. We are here to solve this problem.”
Mohammad Al-Razaz, co-founder and CEO of OTO.
OTO has grown by 300 percent in the year to date in the number of processed orders compared to 2020 and it is expected to grow by 500 percent by the end of 2021. They have more than 400 registered brands shipping their online orders locally and internationally, including well-known brands like Zain, SACO, Arabian Oud, Zohoor Alreef, The Body Shop, Cardial and others.
“If pizza can be ordered, prepared, backed, packed, and delivered to your door in less than 45 minutes, then why does your online-ordered shirt take 4 – 5 days to be delivered?” said Al-Razaz. “Our technology enables e-commerce stores, omnichannel retailers, marketplaces and fulfillment centres to enjoy an Amazon-like experience by automating the operational processes, improving the delivery times, and getting access to discounted shipping fees.
“In less than five minutes, our customers can connect their ecommerce platform to their physical store/warehouses to a pool of shipping carriers”
In just 18 months, OTO has built integrations with over 100 carriers and 15 sales channels, making them the largest integrator for shipping services in the MENA region. OTO is currently offering its services in Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, and Egypt. The company plans to continue hiring top talents from around the world while supporting triple-digit revenue growth.
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