The Middle East gets its own social platform for startups
Recently, I’ve become increasingly convinced that the Middle East is going through its dotcom boom. Today, the brilliant folks at ArabCrunch, a site I admittedly check every morning, launched a tool that we’ve been desperately in need of.
ArabCrunch.net is the first social network focused at fostering entrepreneurship in the region by connecting our local entrepreneurs with mentors from around the world. The site has the blessing of Bassel Yassine Ojjeh, of D1g fame and a former senior executive at Yahoo! who invested in ArabCrunch.The launch came at a conference held at the Queen Rania Center for Entrepreneurship, which may explain why only last week the good folk from ArabCrunch tweeted from Her Majesty’s office.
There has been a mention of quite a few successful Arab entrepreneurs in the press lately. It was only yesterday that Google announced their acquisition of AdMob, a company headed by an Arab entrepreneur Omar Hamoui; not to forget the likes of Samih Touqan and Rabea Ataya, all with much to offer young entrepreneurs.
ArabCrunch.net is currently in private beta (do you guys think I can get an invite? Please. Pretty please!)
So, what do you think? Is this it? Is this our dotcom boom? Leave your comments below, we’d love to know what you think.
Khaled’s passion for tech started at a young age. He believes it may have been somewhere around the age of four when he first tried to electrocute himself while putting the laws of physics to test, and the age of 6 when he received his first computer, a ZX Spectrum 16K/48K. Since then, he has developed a passion for all things digital and has been known to spend hours fiddling with toasters that have some intelligence in them. He still can’t make a sandwich though!To learn more about Khaled visit his LinkedIn profile at http://ae.linkedin.com/in/alsaleh
This is a great venture… and will definitely help the growing Arab DotCom scene. I am lucky enough to have access and it’s a slick tool, and I hope it grows well, as the value of these platforms is with the community itself.
I completely agree with your observation about the Arab scene, there does seem to be a strong vibe at the moment amongst most countries (I’m even working on a few projects myself)… and it’s great to see.
Great to see innovator like him ! Keep it on !