Egypt’s Breadfast Raises $26 Million To Expand Its On-demand Grocery Delivery Service across Africa And The Middle East

Breadfast, Egypt’s leading online grocery delivery company, announced that it has raised $26 Million in a Series A round. The funding round was led by Vostok New Ventures and Endure Capital,  with participation from JAM Fund (led by Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen), YC Continuity Fund, a large unnamed Saudi-based fund, Shorooq Partners, 4DX Ventures, and logistics giant Flexport. The investment comes two years after Breadfast raised $2 million in a pre-Series A round. So far, the company has raised more than $33 million since its launch in 2017.

The investment comes amid the rapid growth of the food and grocery delivery market in Egypt, buoyed by the country’s young and growing population. Impressively, the market for food and grocery delivery across Africa and the Middle East is worth nearly $1 trillion.

Founded by Mostafa Amin, Muhammad Habib and Abdallah Nofal, Breadfast started as a scheduled bakery delivery service that delivered freshly made bread and pastries to customers’ doorsteps each morning. This was borne out of the pain of poor services, and the founders set out to improve Egyptians’ access to key staples as well as excellent services. Now, the company has evolved into a full-on online grocery store.

According to the company, customers can now access a far greater range of products with more than 2,500 supermarket items. Every part of the supply chain – from the building of the technology to the sourcing of goods, the delivery to its ‘dark stores’, and to the last-mile delivery to customers – is directly supervised by Breadfast. The company owns some of the products it distributes (like bread and coffee), but also sources other goods from FMCGs such as Unilever, Pepsi and Coca-Cola, which it distributes across its web of dark stores.

Commenting on the funding, Mostafa Amin, Breakfast’s Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder said: “Our mission is to change how people consume their daily essentials in Africa and the Middle East and, through our dynamic technology and deep understanding of the end-to-end supply chain process in the region, we are growing a simple idea into a product we believe can benefit millions of people across the MENA and Sub-Saharan regions. We are delighted to be joined by a number of vastly-experienced and strategic investors, whose expertise will not only play a vital role ahead of our expansion across Africa but also in our future ambitions outside of the continent.”

Björn von Sivers, the Investment Manager at VNV Global, also said: “Over the past few years, Breadfast fueled its growth by offering something that’s highly scarce in emerging markets; an exceptionally good customer experience and solid operational excellence. We see Breadfast becoming one of the most successful companies to come out of Africa and the Middle East. We at VNV Global are excited to embark on this journey of changing the customers’ experience and making them happy. We look forward to taking over the Q-commerce space with the Breadfast team.”

Interestingly, the funding comes a day after Appetito —an Egyptian on-demand grocery delivery firm that offers comparable services with Breadfast— raised $2 million in pre-Series A funding led by Jedar Capital. This only confirms that there is a growing demand in the region for online grocery delivery services and that startups, as well as investors, are seizing the unique opportunities that the region provides.

According to the company, the new funds will be used to expand to eight new cities in Egypt, reduce delivery time to 20 minutes (from 60 minutes), upscale the ‘pocket supermarket’ app, and enhance the growth of its grocery delivery service across MENA and Sub-Saharan Africa.