Telr, the payments company based out of Singapore and Dubai, has merged with a payment gateway in the United Arab Emirates to launch its services to ecommerce websites across the Middle East.
- Telr website
The company, founded by ex-PayPal Middle East director Elias Ghanem, plans to offer ecommerce websites a payment gateway and delivery of goods, and will also provide short-term financing to help scale some startups.
On Wednesday, Telr announced a merger with Dubai-based payment gateway Innovate Payments, which already boasts customers such as fashion website Namshi, chauffeur booking app Careem, and healthy food delivery service Kcal.
Rather than build its own payment gateway, Telr acquired Innovate to more quickly hit the market, said Elias Ghanem, the chief executive of Telr. “Through this merger, we are now in business.” No financial details on the deal were disclosed.
Telr, which was established in March, had already signed an agreement with logistics company Aramex to provide delivery services for its ecommerce customers. It will begin operations with ecommerce sites based in the U.A.E., and then expand to the rest of the region in the next three months.
Mr. Ghanem, who quit PayPal last year, said his goal is to simplify payment, logistics and financing for startups in the Middle East, a region where funding for new businesses is scarce and well-established ecommerce players have struggled to perfect delivery.
Although not a direct competitor with PayPal, Telr plans to take a slice of a growing ecommerce market in the Middle East. PayPal forecasts online spending in the Arab world will grow from $9 billion in 2012 to $15 billion next year, although cash-on-delivery is still the region’s favored method of payment for online shopping.
Mr. Ghanem said Telr, which is funded by Singapore-based accelerator Hatcher, will announce a partnership with a financial institution before the end of the year that will enable it to offer short-term loans to ecommerce websites. Those loans will be based on the size and volume of transactions passing through its payment gateway.
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(via WSJ Blogs)
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