OneOrder raises $3 million Seed

OneOrder, the Mena-based fintech-enabled restaurant management platform providing food supplies to hotels, restaurants and cafes, has today announced the close of a $3m Seed round. Led by Nclude, this round also sees follow-on investment from leading Mena early-stage VC, A15. New to the round is Delivery Hero Ventures, a fund backed by global food delivery giant Delivery Hero, whose managing partner, Brendon Blacker, joins the OneOrder board. Today’s announcement brings the company’s total investment to $10.5 million, following an initial $1 million pre-Seed investment, led by A15, and $6.5 million in working capital financing from multiple local NBFIs.

OneOrder will use the latest capital injection to bolster its in-house operations and tech talent, scale its sales force to build its market share and will invest heavily in its proprietary technology. In addition, the technology-powered food and hospitality platform will deploy additional capital into scaling its offline presence, and expand its warehouse footprint across Egypt and the Mena region. 

Launched in Cairo, Egypt in 2021 by co-founders Tamer Amer and Karim Maurice, OneOrder is using technology to solve the supply chain pain points in Egypt’s $40 billion HoReCa market, such as lack of product availability, price fluctuations, product consistency, on time and accurate delivery and a lack of working capital financing. 

The OneOrder app, available in iOS and Android versions aggregates hundreds of trusted and vetted suppliers onto one platform. This significantly reduces the current process where restaurants liaise with up to 70 different suppliers and f    ace poor fulfilment quotas due to a fragmented and opaque supply chain. OneOrder additionally gives customers access to a catalogue of ~600 SKUs of their food and non-food supplies, including a curated selection of chilled and frozen items, which are available for next day delivery. OneOrder’s mass purchasing power allows them to secure the lowest prices, thanks to economies of scale. This, in turn, reduces cost of goods sold and eliminates the need for hospitality companies to pay for additional storage and warehousing costs. 

OneOrder uses its proprietary technology to build massive value and improve efficiencies across the supply chain from customer to supplier, ensuring a frictionless process from order to fulfilment. Customers have access to a personalised dashboard where they can order and manage their stock. For suppliers, and to ensure product availability and fast and accurate fulfilment, OneOrder also manages all of its warehouse inventory through its proprietary warehouse management system.  

Having full visibility of the end-to-end process has also allowed OneOrder to develop a new financing proposition for its customers, in a bid to address the lack of working capital for restaurants. With more visibility of customers' revenue and purchasing patterns, OneOrder can build long-term relationships with its customer base and subsequently provide flexible, low risk financial support products, based on data-backed intelligence. This has led to OneOrder recently partnering with financial technology enabler, PayMob, to offer working capital financing and additional payment methods to long tail restaurants.

Speaking on the round, Tamer Amer, Cofounder and CEO OneOrder stated, ‘As a restauranteur myself, I have witnessed first hand the avoidable overheads and hassles HoReCa businesses go through in serving their customers. We are delighted by the level of adoption and growth we have recorded over the past year which is testament to the fact that we are addressing a huge unmet demand in our region. Asides improving efficiency, we are reducing costs and impacting restaurants’ bottom lines - saving them time through operational efficiency and money through improved purchasing power and economies of scale. Joined by prominent global investors with deep knowledge and extensive expertise in our sector, we look forward to our next phase of rapid growth.’ 

Basil Moftah, Managing Partner at Nclude added, ‘We have been impressed by OneOrder’s remarkable progress, driven by the unparalleled market expertise of Tamer, Karim and the entire team. The product-market fit of the OneOder solution is very impressive, along with the positive impact it is delivering to all stakeholders in the value chain. Through the use of technology and alternative data, OneOrder’s embedded financing will help underserved clients who are unable to secure traditional financing.  This aligns perfectly with our investing philosophy and we are glad to be embarking on this journey with the team.’

The funding round also sees OneOrder strengthen its board with the addition of Brendon Blacker, who brings his deep experience investing in and working with technology-enabled companies in the F&B industry globally. 

Brendon Blacker, Managing Partner at Delivery Hero Ventures, commented, ‘I'm privileged to be able to join OneOrder’s board and support the company’s rapid expansion plans. The explosive growth of the business in the last year is testament to the huge value that OneOrder’s industry-focused solution has been able to generate for its HoReCa customers. I am very excited for the journey ahead with Tamer, Karim and the OneOrder team.’

Karim Beshara, Managing Partner of A15, added, "A15 is excited to continue backing Tamer, Karim and the entire OneOrder team on their journey to solve HoReCa procurement pain points in Egypt and beyond. Having met Tamer during the ideation stage of the company, we are proud of what OneOrder has achieved since launch and look forward to the next chapter of the story alongside our new partners."

In Egypt alone, OneOrder has a TAM of 400,000 restaurants who on aggregate spend $40B annually. Lack of vertically integrated supply chains sees these restaurants spend between 6-7% of their revenues to ensure supply chain stability. OneOrder’s timely proprietary tech platform engineers a seamless ordering process, offering users 360 degree visibility over their businesses with advanced analytics and reports. Among other goals, the start-up now intends to focus on the next stage of its AI and machine learning journey to enhance demand planning for restaurants making sure they are never out of stock, account for high and low seasons and eliminate waste.

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