Arabian Post Staff -Dubai
The financing has been extended to SILQ, a Saudi financial technology platform that provides procurement, payment and funding services to small and medium-sized enterprises. The transaction gives Gemcorp an initial foothold in a market where growing companies often struggle to secure flexible credit through conventional banking channels.
Structured to comply with Islamic finance principles, the facility avoids interest-based lending and instead uses contractual arrangements built around identifiable assets, transactions or profit mechanisms. The precise maturity, pricing and security package were not disclosed.
Gemcorp said the deal expands its emerging-markets private credit franchise into Saudi Arabia and provides a foundation for further investments combining financial technology with private lending. Petar Ivanovic, a principal at the firm, described it as Gemcorp’s first direct lending deal in the kingdom.
The transaction comes as Saudi Arabia seeks to increase the contribution of small and medium-sized businesses to gross domestic product from about 20 per cent to 35 per cent by 2030. Authorities have also encouraged financial institutions to raise the share of lending directed towards smaller enterprises.
SILQ operates in a segment where businesses require working capital to purchase inventory, settle suppliers and manage the gap between sales and payment receipts. Gemcorp’s funding is expected to support financing distributed through the company’s platform, rather than being confined to a single large corporate borrower.
That model allows a private lender to gain exposure to a portfolio of business transactions while relying on a technology provider to originate, process and monitor financing. It also reflects a wider shift in private credit towards platforms that can generate multiple smaller loans through digital systems.
Saudi Arabia’s private credit market remains at an early stage compared with established markets in the United States and Europe. However, demand is expanding as government-led investment, infrastructure construction and private-sector growth increase companies’ funding needs.
Banks remain the dominant source of corporate finance in the kingdom, but lending capacity has been constrained by tighter liquidity and strong demand from large projects. Smaller businesses and technology companies may also require repayment terms or security structures that fall outside traditional bank lending standards.
Those gaps have attracted international asset managers, alternative lenders and global investment banks. Goldman Sachs, Apollo and other major financial groups have been building private-credit capabilities across the Gulf, where governments are seeking to deepen capital markets and reduce dependence on bank balance sheets.
Private credit offers borrowers negotiated facilities that can be adapted to cash flow, asset ownership or business expansion plans. The trade-off is that such financing can carry higher costs and stricter protections than conventional loans, including collateral requirements, financial covenants and closer lender oversight.
The use of Shariah-compliant structures is particularly important in Saudi Arabia, where Islamic finance is central to the domestic financial system. Common structures include murabaha arrangements based on the purchase and resale of assets, leasing contracts and partnership-based financing.
Gemcorp has not identified the particular Islamic contract used for the SILQ transaction. Shariah compliance normally requires approval from qualified advisers and documentation designed to ensure that returns arise from permitted commercial activity rather than the payment of interest.
The deal follows Gemcorp’s broader effort to establish a Saudi investment platform. The London-headquartered firm agreed in 2023 to work with the Ministry of Investment on a fund targeting as much as $1 billion across credit and equity opportunities.
Priority areas identified for that initiative included energy, infrastructure, minerals and mining. Gemcorp has also indicated that it is examining technology, education, healthcare and worker accommodation projects, alongside financing for mid-market companies.
Founded in 2014 by Atanas Bostandjiev, Gemcorp specialises in private capital for emerging economies. The employee-owned group had invested more than $9 billion by the end of 2025 and has financed projects and companies across Africa, Latin America and other developing markets.
Its investments have included energy infrastructure, commodity trade, transport and essential services. The firm has increasingly promoted private credit as a source of capital for businesses that are viable but underserved by international banks and public debt markets.
Institutional interest in the asset class is rising. Forty-two per cent of investors surveyed across 22 countries planned to increase their emerging-market private-credit allocations over the following two years, while average exposure remained below 6 per cent of private-credit portfolios.
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