Catalyst Secures $12.5M Boost to Spur Egypt’s Non-Banking Finance Growth

Egypt’s Catalyst Leasing & Factoring has pulled in fresh banking facilities worth $12.5 million, lining up more firepower to strengthen its financing offering. The facility, equal to around EGP 600 million, comes courtesy of a consortium that includes Abu Dhabi Commercial Bank Egypt, Suez Canal Bank, and the National Bank of Egypt. And the company isn’t stopping there — it’s already eyeing a bump to roughly EGP 1.2 billion in total by the close of 2025.

Catalyst, a subsidiary of Catalyst Partners Middle East, was founded back in 2013. The parent group is well established in investment banking and private equity, while its leasing and factoring arm zeroes in on providing tailored financing options for medium- and large-sized businesses. That means helping firms not just cover short-term liquidity gaps but also fuelling their growth plans.

This move reflects something quite clear in Egypt’s wider economic landscape. The country’s non-banking financial services (NBFI) sector has been gathering steam, partly thanks to government steps encouraging greater private sector access to funding. Leasing and factoring, once seen as niche, are now spot on when it comes to diversifying away from traditional bank lending. They offer a more flexible toolkit for companies looking to push ahead with new projects.

Catalyst has framed these new facilities as a way to craft more customised products for different industries — from manufacturing to services and beyond. And on the flip side, these tools could plug neatly into Egypt’s broader push to encourage private investment, particularly in areas like infrastructure and renewable energy. Only last month, for example, the Ministry of Finance teamed up with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to roll out a €10 million public–private partnership fund aimed at easing feasibility bottlenecks and trimming project timelines.

I remember being at Techne Summit in Alexandria a few years ago, looking around at founders juggling financing with sheer grit and persistence. It struck me then how access to different forms of capital can make or break a young business. Seeing announcements like this one from Catalyst, I reckon the financing ecosystem is slowly maturing to meet that need. It’s not always smooth sailing — paperwork in Egypt can be a bit of a faff — but moves like these show things are shifting.

For those of us at Arageek who spend plenty of time among MENA entrepreneurs, it’s easy to see why this matters: it’s not just a technical financial deal, it’s a signal that companies are being given more creative ways to grow. And believe it or not, that sort of shift can ripple through the startup scene as much as through established corporates. One thing’s for sure: I’m chuffed to bits whenever financial innovation aligns with real business growth, because that’s when ideas truly take flight — even if it’s sometimes messy, or, well… definately delayed.

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