Telecommunications firm Saudi Telecom has formed a $500m corporate venturing fund called STV that it expects to begin investing by the fourth quarter of 2017, Reuters reported yesterday.
The Saudi Arabia-based company has since late 2011 invested in IT, telecom, media and entertainment companies through an independently managed venture capital fund called STC Ventures.
The new fund will also be managed independently and will target companies developing artificial intelligence, virtual reality, banking, logistics and digital health technology and services. It aims to invest roughly $100m per year over the next four to five years.
Abdulrahman Tarabzouni is heading the fund as chief executive, having joined Saudi Telecom in October 2016 from internet technology provider Google where he was global head of new business and partnerships.
“We have a lot in the pipeline,” Tarabzouni told Reuters. “Our job is going to be to identify the winners and make bets on them over the next few months.”
Tarabzouni had previously told Bloomberg in an interview in March this year that Saudi Telecom was seeking to increase its investments in digital technologies to ensure it remained viable as legacy telecom diminished as a business.
STV will also manage the 10% stake in United Arab Emirates-based ride hailing service Careem that Saudi Telecom acquired in December 2016 for $100m. STC Ventures had been an investor in Careem since its 2013 series A round.
STC Ventures is meanwhile still investing, most recently backing the $3.5m series B round closed by UAE-based finance and insurance policy comparison platform Comapreitforme this week.