KSA-Based Orbii Raises US$3.6 Million To Scale SME Lending Across The MENA

Orbii, a Riyadh-based credit infrastructure startup, has secured US$3.6 million in a seed funding round led by Prosus Ventures, the venture capital (VC) arm of global consumer internet company Prosus.  Other investors included the MENA-focused VC firm VentureSouq, regional early-stage investor DASH Ventures, Riyadh-based VC Taz Investment, and Sanabil 500, the Saudi-backed seed fund supporting startups across KSA and beyond. 

Founded by Nauman Ali, Nasara Mughal, and Guillaume Kieffer in Saudi Arabia in 2024, Orbii is an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven embedded lending platform that enables banks, fintechs, and B2B ecosystems to develop and scale SME credit products. In an interview with Inc. Arabia, Ali, CEO of Orbii, highlighted how the startup is transforming SME financing across the MENA region by addressing some of the key structural challenges to credit access in the region.

“There are numerous challenges: thin or non-existent credit history, fragmented data sources, lengthy approval processes, and an emphasis on historical analysis,” Ali said. “Orbii tackles these by using a combination of alternative data and machine learning models to assess risk and automate the underwriting process. Instead of SMEs being judged by a lack of past borrowing, they’re assessed by real business performance and financial behavior today and predictive capabilities that were not previously possible.”

At the core of Orbii’s differentiation is a data philosophy that challenges the very foundation of traditional credit scoring. “Traditional lenders depend on backward-looking data, credit scores, audited financials etc.,” he said. “Orbii flips that model and believes credit scores as we know them today will effectively become deprecated. We ingest real-time, forward-looking data such [as] transactional data from a variety of different financial sources, supplier data, data that goes beyond macroeconomic indicators, that [have] proven to show an order of magnitude [better way] to determine eligibility.”

So, how does Orbii do this? Ali explained that what sets Orbii’s approach apart is its use of AI and machine learning (ML) to redefine creditworthiness for SMEs. This, he said, lowers default rates and increases loan approvals compared with traditional manual processes. “We apply machine learning (ML) that identifies repayment signals from thousands of non-traditional variables, rather than a single rigid score, [and] all of this is highly contextualized to the business,” he explained. “We continuously retrain models, so risk insights evolve dynamically with SME performance. This means SMEs that would otherwise be ‘invisible’ become financeable, without taking on disproportionate risk."

In making those SMEs both visible and financeable, Orbii is carving out an entirely new market, while also facilitating loans to companies that might not otherwise have qualified for them. Additionally, Orbii is leveraging the culture, strategy, and growth momentum of the region to set a bold target for itself: to unlock $1 billion in SME financing by 2026. This, Ali explained, will be made possible by the radical changes taking place across the region’s regulatory and financial landscape. “When countries like Saudi Arabia and UAE set bold visions, it takes big ideas to achieve them,” Ali said. “Part of the culture within Orbii is setting bold targets but even more so, making sure we get there. This allows us to constantly think outside the box, and that’s the Orbii way.”

Ali also pointed to how regulatory reforms and the fast pace of change in regional market dynamics are creating increased demand for tech-enabled SME financing, creating a unique opportunity for startups like Orbii. “In Saudi Arabia, credit demand is surging,” he said. “And across the MENA, we’ve seen a 44 percent growth in capital need to around $340 billion. This creates a widening structural gap that Orbii is well placed to fill. The UAE is a well-known hub for SMEs and cross-border trade, with a vibrant fintech regulatory environment. Demand is growing particularly among high growth startups that needs to be served. We are seeing lenders offering diversified products to serve different lending needs, from micro-loans, working capital, invoice factoring, if ever there was a need for intelligence to help deploy credit, it’s now. Both markets are on the cusp of needing more flexible, tech-enabled financing models.”

But that’s not to say that Orbii’s work will be plug-and-play either, with Ali pointing to just a few of the challenges that lie ahead for the startup. “Of course, we will need to solve distribution and capital, all by pushing the technological needle,” he added. “ We have strong conviction in our strategy across the KSA and UAE, and we believe this bold target is very achievable. We have had a strong Q1 and Q2 in 2025 and have enabled lenders to deploy over $280 million this year, and we have a strong belief in compounding this growth.”

Orbii’s scaling will be fueled by the fresh capital that it has now raised, which will enable it to grow its engineering and data science teams, enhance integrations with financial platforms, and broaden its presence in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. “Raising $3.6 million signals strong conviction from world-class investors in Orbii’s model and market fit," Ali said. "It gives us the runway to accelerate product development, deepen our data science capabilities, and expand credit coverage to even more SMEs. Practically, it shifts us from proving the model to scaling it across markets. Strategically, it sets Orbii on a trajectory to become a leading alternative credit intelligence layer for SMEs."

Ali also highlighted that securing the backing of the host of world-class investors has provided the company with both validation and operational leverage. “Having Prosus in the round was a huge conviction since they are known for investing in some of the most innovative tech companies globally, [while] VentureSouq and Dash Ventures, [which] are very founder-focused yet specialized within the fintech space [means] we could leverage their expertise,” he said. “Sanabil 500, with their strong network in the KSA ecosystem, gave us another leverage point. We feel very grateful for having a strong backbone through our investors that will help Orbii expand faster."

When asked how Orbii managed to secure the support of such investors, Ali said that a strategic mindset was key.  “We took a proactive approach to share Orbii’s progress every month to a curated list of investors we really wanted to get the attention of," he shared. "Through this, we demonstrated that we were building a product that addresses the issue of capital for SMEs, and empowering lenders to shorten evaluation times while reducing risk through models we built that increased confidence in deploying credit. We were transparent about our growth and trajectory, and I think that really helped us get investors on board that shared a similar mindset and shared vision." 

Looking toward the future, Ali shared that expansion is on the cards for Orbii. “We see natural adjacency in Egypt, Jordan, and Pakistan," Ali revealed. "Each has large SME bases underserved by formal credit, increasing digitalization of payments and banking, and governments actively promoting SME financing as a growth engine. Expanding here creates a regional network effect, more data, more financing, and stronger regional positioning."

Pictured in the lead image is Nauman Ali, co-founder and CEO of Orbii. Courtesy of Orbii.