NEOM Investment Fund Launched to Back StartUps

NEOM, the developer of the futuristic urban area in Saudi Arabia's Tabuk province, inaugurated its strategic investment arm, the NEOM Investment Fund (NIF). The fund will support the buildout and development of the project’s 14 priority sectors and deliver long-term value, while enabling the creation of jobs.

NIF, NEOM’s wholly owned subsidiary, will invest globally through mergers and acquisitions and venture capital in technology startups, with a focus on pioneering growth companies and next-generation industries. NIF will also develop joint ventures and partnerships with large multinationals, institutional investors, and innovators within NEOM, a company statement said. 

As part of its inauguration, NIF has announced new investments in companies including Regent, Pony.AI, Boom Technology, BlueNalu, and Animoca Brands, details of which will be shared in the coming days. 

These investments, which add to those NIF has led to date, illustrate its role in working alongside NEOM sectors to support their strategies for growth, enabling new technologies, establishing businesses, and creating a thriving economy in NEOM, it said.

Majid Mufti, CEO of NEOM Investment Fund, said in the statement: “The NIF strategy is designed to align NEOM’s development objectives with those of innovators and institutional investors, de-risking opportunities for them to participate in creating core global growth businesses and a thriving economy in NEOM. To date, NIF has invested in several technology companies within the 14 priority sectors of NEOM that will accelerate technologies critical to the NEOM project and have a major impact on the future of living and sustainability. Replicated over time, this approach will position NEOM as a model for sustainable economic development.”

NIF actively seeks deep partnerships with like-minded investors and entrepreneurs working on the world’s most complex problems, in line with NEOM’s vision. It aspires to create regional and global champion companies across NEOM’s 14 economic sectors by investing in commercially viable projects and ‘moonshot’ ideas enabled by cutting-edge technologies. To accelerate the change, NIF will focus on developing investment opportunities for the private sector to participate in and will directly invest to unlock solutions that would be piloted and scaled up in NEOM, and eventually exported to the world, the statement said.