The status of Egypt’s deep tech sector: Globally, the deep tech sector has been growing exponentially over the past 20 years, with European-founded deep tech startups jumping almost 270% between 2010 and 2020, according to a report (pdf) by European Startups. In Egypt, the story is a little bit different — although the country has some competitive advantages for deep tech players, the sector remains quite nascent, due primarily to the high cost and highly skilled employees required to set up a company, local industry players tell us.
What is deep tech?
Deep tech refers to technology solutions for end users that rely on innovative engineering, using tools like AI, machine learning, big data, robotics, blockchain, or even biotech and quantum computing. It can be used across industries, including energy, healthcare and defense to provide better services and products, as well as help understand customer behavior more efficiently.
There are a few startups in Egypt that focus on deep tech — but not necessarily enough. In MENA, 31 deep tech-focused startups raised over USD 32.5 mn of investment in the first nine months of 2021 — 10 of which were based in Egypt, according to Wamda. Last October, local VC outfit Sequence Ventures established a EGP 500 mn deep tech fund, looking to invest in healtech, fintech, edtech, proptech, logistics and development and operations (DevOps) startups, which focus on using deep tech. While there is no specific data about how many local deep tech startups currently exist, we know that Sequence Ventures’ fund has invested USD 10 mn in local deep tech startups, and currently has around 20 deep tech startups in the pipeline.
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