Egyptian startup Tyro, an ed-tech platform connecting students with qualified instructors through one-to-one and group sessions, is acquiring Nafham, a social startup that offers free crowd-sourced educational content, under a share-swap agreement.
Tyro is an online tutoring platform that connects students with top professional instructors, and is currently operating in Egypt, the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Saudi Arabia, while Nafham has built an online platform that provides school curriculum and life skills content.
The acquisition agreement sees Tyro’s leadership taking over Nafham’s management and operations, with the aim of enhancing the customer experience of Nafham’s six million users. Tyro will be the overall holding company and will continue to deliver live tutoring services as well as extending technology capabilities to the group. Tyro has also secured funding for the new entity from several investors including Flat6Labs and NXL Partners.
“Both companies joining forces will technically make us the largest ed-tech platform in the MENA region, providing both live online tutoring as well as recorded educational video content,” said Mokhtar Osman, Tyro’s chief executive officer (CEO).
“It is crucial to capitalise on both the technology capabilities, and a solid customer base, to be successful. With this merger, we are well-positioned to take the platform to the next level. Nafham has a very strong and established brand presence within the MENA region which is why we’ll be focusing on further strengthening the Nafham brand.”
