Hub71 grows startup community to over 200 companies with latest cohort

Hub71, Abu Dhabi’s global tech ecosystem, has expanded its community to more than 200 startups following the selection of 20 companies to join its latest cohort.

The new cohort is Hub71’s third intake of startups this year, following a 60% increase in applications from founders worldwide looking to join Abu Dhabi’s global tech ecosystem.

Badr Al-Olama, Acting CEO of Hub71, said: “Hub71 has now reached a key milestone of building a community of over 200 tech startups in Abu Dhabi. This success is testament that Abu Dhabi is becoming a destination for high quality startups that showcase great potential and impact. The startups in our latest cohort have reinforced themselves with half a billion dirhams of funding, and we look forward to their evolution towards global prowess on the world stage.” 

The startups will gain access to Hub71’s vibrant community, which is part of a vast tech ecosystem of active investors, corporate, government, and academic partners who serve as key drivers of business growth. The global tech ecosystem in Abu Dhabi is designed to assist founders in scaling successful tech companies and to maximize investment and commercial opportunities from the UAE’s capital. Startups will also benefit from flexible incentives to ease the process and cost of establishing themselves.

Hub71 is welcoming a new cohort of startups from six countries around the world. Nine of the 20 startups in the cohort are based in the UAE, while the remaining 11 have relocated to Abu Dhabi, demonstrating the UAE capital’s ability to attract high-quality companies that add to Hub71’s global diversity.

Hub71 chose startups operating in strategic sectors of the economy to support Abu Dhabi’s economic transformation. CleanTech is one of the sectors where Hub71 chose 44.01, a carbon reduction company that eliminates CO2 by transferring it into rock. AgTech companies were also chosen, with the addition of iFarm from Finland, which develops innovative agriculture technologies to enable automated vertical farming. FinTech, which is rapidly embracing the convergence of finance and technology in Abu Dhabi, was also a focus. Thndr, a Dutch FinTech startup, has already raised more than AED 80 million (US$22 million) in funding for its digital investment platform, which is regulated by the Egyptian Financial Regulatory Authority.