Nawy Secures Gulf Expansion with Strategic SmartCrowd Acquisition

Malaz Madani

Last updated 9-07-2025

3 min

Egyptian startup Nawy acquires a majority stake in UAE's SmartCrowd to enter the Gulf market.

Nawy's innovative services include "Nawy Shares" for fractional investment and "live now, pay later" options.

SmartCrowd allows investors to buy small income-generating real estate shares starting at $150.

The acquisition aids Nawy's UAE and broader GCC expansion plans, supported by recent $52m funding.

Observers see this as a bold step towards cross-border collaborations in the MENA startup scene.

Egyptian real-estate startup Nawy has just snapped up a majority stake in the UAE's SmartCrowd, a notable move marking its first major step towards expanding into the lucrative Gulf market. Now, that's the kind of cross-border growth story we at Arageek love to see in the regional startup scene!

If you're not already familiar, Nawy has built a solid reputation since launching in 2019, thanks to its innovative services in property listings and brokering real-estate deals. The startup is perhaps best-known for "Nawy Shares," its fractional real estate investment product that helps investors dip their toes into the property game without breaking the bank. Another offering is a "live now, pay later" solution, designed to make housing more accessible—spot on for today's challenging housing market.

On the other hand, Dubai-based SmartCrowd, founded a year earlier in 2018, operates a platform allowing investors to buy small chunks of income-generating real estate starting at just $150. Pretty nifty, eh? This strategic acquisition could turn out to be a game changer for Nawy, providing it with a golden ticket to enter the UAE market and gradually expand further across the GCC.

It's worth mentioning, this isn't Nawy's first rodeo when it comes to acquisitions. Previously, they scooped up the real-estate company ROA, later reshaping it into "Nawy Unlocked," which specialises in turning properties into attractive rentable units. And believe it or not, Nawy has been attracting quite a bit of investor confidence—recently raising a hefty $52 million in Series A funding, alongside a $23 million financing in debt.

As an observer of the MENA startup scene, I reckon it's exciting to watch these strategic acquisitions unfold. I admit I'm not big on unnecessary mergers, but moves like this seem to reflect real ambition and a solid plan for regional domination. Although, pulling off smooth expansions across new markets can be a bit of a faff at times, Nawy seems clearly determined to give it a good crack.

So there you have it—a budding Egyptian real estate powerhouse making waves through a strategic stake in a UAE counterpart. It's the kind of deal that could set the tone for even more cross-border collaborations across the startup landscapes in both countries.

We’ll definitly keep an eye on how things unfold from here—and I'm sure our Arageek readers will be watching closely too.

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