Anghami, the music streaming platform and service in the Middle East and North Africa, is set to become the first Arab technology company to be listed on New York’s stock exchange – NASDAQ, as part of a $220 million deal.
Anghami has partnered with Vistas Media Acquisition Company, a publicly traded special purpose acquisition company led by CEO F. Jacob Cherian and co-founders Saurabh Gupta and Abhayanand Singh.
The combined company will operate under the Anghami name and will trade under the new symbol “ANGH.” The transaction is expected to close in Q2 of 2021.
Founded in 2012, by Eddy Maroun and Elie Habib, Anghami is the first music-streaming platform in the MENA region. The platform has more than 57 million songs to more than 70 million registered users with around 1 billion streams per month. Anghami’s AI and machine learning algorithms process over 56 million data points from its user base every day.
With an Arabic speaking population of over 450 million globally, a listing on NASDAQ allows Anghami to scale its user base and invest in technology to build on its data play.
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Eddy Maroun, Co-founder and CEO of Anghami, said, “Today, we have taken a significant step forward in our growth plans in seeking to become the region’s first Arab technology company to list on NASDAQ. Being a US listed public company gives us access to growth capital and a global platform that is the best in the world.”
Elie Habib, Co-founder, Chairman and CTO of Anghami, added, “We’re proud of the product and technology we’ve been able to build and now we will have the ability to invest more in R&D and innovate providing a product that goes beyond music to immersive experiences around media and entertainment while remaining relevant to our users and focused on our local edge.”
The Company has long standing partnerships with all major global labels including Universal Music Group, Sony Music and Warner Music Group. Anghami has a physical presence in major countries in the MENA region to establish and maintain strong partnerships with labels, creators, brands and telecommunication companies.
In addition, the company has established direct partnerships with 36 telecommunication companies across the MENA region to boost free user acquisitions and facilitate subscriptions achieving the highest paying conversion rate in emerging markets.
The Company is headquartered in Abu Dhabi, at the Abu Dhabi Global Market (“ADGM”), and has offices in Beirut, Dubai, Cairo and Riyadh.
