Mylerz raises over EGP 100 mn to fund domestic expansion

Cairo-based last-mile delivery and fulfillment firm Mylerz tapped its shareholders for more than EGP 100 mn in fresh debt and equity, it said in a statement (pdf). The raise is mostly equity, with a smaller debt component, and will go primarily toward shoring up the balance sheet, funding working capital, and supporting infrastructure growth at home, founder and CEO Samer Gharaibeh tells EnterpriseAM.

Who’s who: No new investors joined — existing shareholders, including Gharaibeh, participated in proportion to their stakes, he tells us. Gharaibeh remains the single largest individual shareholder in the company, which he founded in 2019. Private equity firm Lorax Capital Partners and e-payments firm Fawry also sit on the cap table, having invested some USD 9.6 mn in a 2022 equity raise.

What the firepower gets

The debt tranche — an overdraft facility — is earmarked for working capital tied to a new cross-border e-commerce contract with what Gharaibeh described only as “the biggest players in the world.”

Why now: Cross-border e-commerce runs on tight cash-conversion cycles, Gharaibeh explains. Mylerz invoices on 30-day terms and collects roughly 15 days after that while fronting daily customs-clearance costs on every package, Gharaibeh says — a 45-day gap between outlay and payback that its prior working-capital base couldn’t absorb as the new business scaled.

Most of the raise is going toward infrastructure, Gharaibeh says. Mylerz is opening a new hub in Sharm El Sheikh to serve the city’s growing e-commerce and tourism traffic, plus sites in Upper Egypt and further build-out in Cairo, on top of the 26 hubs it runs nationwide. “We're looking to reach over 30 very soon,” he adds.

What’s next

Refocusing on home turf: The North Africa ambitions Mylerz laid out in 2022 — Algeria, Tunisia, and Morocco, as well as Jordan — are on ice. “ROI in Egypt is much faster than the new operations we open,” Gharaibeh says. “When you put a USD here, you get it back much faster than putting it in North Africa or other geographies.” This raise, he says, “is specifically for Egypt.”

The growth case: Mylerz’s client base has grown more than 200% over two years to over 2k, up from roughly 700, Gharaibeh tells us. The company is profitable, he says, though he wouldn’t give a figure. “We’re growing every month,” suggesting Mylerz is already thinking about next steps. “We need to grow our EBITDA enough to be able to look at an IPO or any next phase of our journey.”