Dubai on Monday launched the Dubai Future District Fund, with an initial purse of AED1 billion, along with the Fund’s website, www.futuredistrictfund.com. The move is part of the Dubai Future District’s (DFD) ongoing efforts to support startups in the field of technology and encourage them to list in the Dubai Financial Markets and stock exchange.
The Fund, an initiative of the Dubai Securities and Exchange Higher Committee, will focus on supporting efforts to implement the directives of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum to establish 1,000 tech companies in the country within five years and increase startup investments from AED1.5 billion to AED4 billion.
“Under the directives of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum and His Highness Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum to support the digital economic sector, we launched today the AED1 billion Dubai Future District Fund to invest in startups,” Sheikh Maktoum bin Mohammed said.Â
He added: “The Fund aims to realise the vision of His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum to establish 1,000 tech companies in the next five years, by supporting Dubai’s digital economy and companies that adopt future technologies and develop new economic sectors of the future.”
As an enabler of Dubai Future District’s other initiatives, the Fund seeks to fill a funding gap in the MENA venture capital (VC) market by investing in technology startups in the early stages of growth. It aims to invest in local and regional funds, as well as attract leading international VC funds to establish a presence in Dubai.
The Dubai Future District Fund seeks to build an innovation-driven startup ecosystem to enhance the global competitiveness of Dubai’s future economy. As part of its mandate, it will invest in a range of key initiatives, including Dubai Future Accelerators, DIFC FinTech Hive and Venture Builder Studios.
The Fund will also seek to attract startups from the MENA region and beyond that can develop innovative solutions for future local, regional and global challenges. It will also support the scale-up of top-performing startups through growth capital and follow-on rounds of investment and attract VC firms to Dubai through a fund of funds programme.
To achieve its objectives, the Fund will leverage emerging technologies, such as AI, cybersecurity, blockchain, data analytics, software-as-a-service (SaaS)/platform-as-a-service (PaaS), cloud solutions, 5G, IoT, augmented reality and robotics.
The Dubai Future District Fund has named Sharif El-Badawi as its CEO, who will play a pivotal role in quickly ramping up the team and executing the Fund’s strategy of contributing to the economy of the future. He will oversee the provision of financing for DFD’s innovation ecosystem, support promising projects and build partnerships with investment capital funds from around the world, in addition to supervising the implementation of the short- and long-term strategic objectives of the Fund. These include developing Dubai’s startup ecosystem, catalysing its growth by direct investment in startups, and encouraging local, regional and global funds to invest in the ecosystem.
Sharif El-Badawi was a founding Managing Partner of Plus Venture Capital (+VC), one of the leading seed stage investment firms in the Middle East and North Africa region. Previously, he co-founded and managed the first US-based venture capital firm with a dedicated fund for the MENA region. In his role, he managed the startup MENA fund, 500 Falcons, which has invested in over 180 startups across 15 countries.