
How’s the back-to-events season with you?
I missed out on Money 20/20 because I got stuck in NYC attending New York Venture Summit 2025.
In other news – turns out at least 17 AI-native MENA startups secured funding in the first 9 months of 2025. So today I’m diving into AI-native, which is the part of the AI world that’s actually building the brains, not just using them.
17 AI-native startups in MENA collectively raised $145 million in the first 9 months of 2025, complemented by at least 53 rounds for AI-enabled startups (source: our in-house research; cut-off date 27 September 2025).
There was also an exit – Egypt-born PlayAI was acquired by Meta. PlayAI uses AI to generate human-sounding voices, and its whole team joined Meta. Sounds like a good win for the region.
A quick terminology recap:
AI-native: AI-native players are more rare but also more powerful, often tackling infrastructure-level problems. The startups’ primary product is an AI model or agentic system:
vs. AI-enabled: Startups present in non-AI verticals (fintech, commerce, logistics, gaming, etc.) where AI is a core enabler (risk, pricing, fraud, personalization), but not the core product.
In fintech, AI is increasingly core, which means that AI is part of the product’s engine (e.g., credit scoring models, fraud detection systems), not just an add-on. Whereas in proptech and traveltech, it’s mostly a strategic layer – enhancing and optimizing existing products rather than driving them. It improves UX, automation and personalization, but the product itself could still exist without it.
Today will be all about AI-native.
Let’s look at the 17 AI-native fundraises in 9M2025.
The top 3 largest deals together bagged $100 million:
Of the $145 million, two thirds went to UAE-based startups ($93.7 million; excluding 3 undisclosed). The remainder went to KSA ($51.2 million) and Kuwait (1 undisclosed).
However, if we consider the number of deals per country, KSA came on top with 8 deals, followed by UAE with 7. Note that Intella and Darwinz AI were both founded in Egypt in 2021 and have since relocated their headquarters to Riyadh.
MENA's Enterprise/Workflow AI platforms collectively secured $80 million in 9M2025.

These 17 rounds are proof that MENA’s AI-native ecosystem hasmatured from “AI experimentation” (prevalent in 2024) to “AI infrastructure and enterprise deployment” in 2025.
Evidence:
MENA’s AI-native ecosystem has entered its deployment era, a phase where we finally get to turn all those ambitions to use.
See you around,
Hasan
17 AI-native startups in MENA collectively raised $145 million in the first 9 months of 2025, complemented by at least 53 rounds for AI-enabled startups. Cherry on the cake: PlayAI’s acquisition by Meta. While 2024 was about AI demos, this year belongs to “AI infrastructure and enterprise deployment”. I analyze the 5 dominant AI-native verticals. Enterprise/Workflow AI Platforms bagged $80 million in 9M2025.