According to information from the U.S. stock channel of the Financial Times, Fordeal, a well-known cross-border e-commerce company in Guangzhou and an e-commerce platform focusing on the Middle East market, completed a C round of financing of tens of millions of dollars from Hillhouse Capital in December last year, with follow-up investments from many old shareholders including Yuanjing, Shunwei, and Xiangfeng Changqing. Subsequently, the company completed its C+ round of financing with investment from Heyu Capital, raising tens of millions of dollars.
Fordeal is a very young cross-border e-commerce company founded in 2017 and headquartered in Guangzhou. The company’s early registered address was in Baiyun District, Guangzhou, with a registered capital of only 100,000 yuan. The CEO is Shi Nian, a former early member of Mogujie and head of the algorithm team. The backgrounds of other core members of the team include former members of well-known companies such as Alibaba, Mogujie, Tencent, Huawei, and Procter & Gamble. Hillhouse Capital is a well-known investment institution. The list of invested companies includes: Tencent, JD.com, Meituan Dianping, Didi, NIO, Uber, Airbnb, Traveloka, Belle International, Peet's Coffee, BeiGene and WuXi AppTec, etc.
Although it has been established for less than 2 years, Fordeal has developed rapidly. Fordeal is often ranked in the top 3 or top 5 in the download rankings of shopping apps in many countries in the Middle East. Its competitors include Noon, a local e-commerce giant in the Middle East, Souq, which was once the No. 1 e-commerce company in the Middle East and was later acquired by Amazon, and Shein and JollyChic, two other Chinese companies that have been deeply involved in the Middle East e-commerce market for many years.
The Middle East market is of great attraction to domestic cross-border e-commerce sellers. Oil-rich Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are both among the richest countries in the world. Qatar's per capita GDP ranks among the highest in the world, and nearly half of the population in the Middle East is under 24 years old. With the popularization of 4G, most people in the Middle East can access the Internet through smartphones. The entire e-commerce market continues to grow, and here, Chinese e-commerce companies are not inferior to competition from Amazon or local platforms in the Middle East.
But this area, where wealthy people abound, also has obvious problems. Language barriers, incomplete address information, low proportion of mobile payments, and high return rate.
To this end, Fordeal recruits employees locally and does a very good job of localization. With more than 80% of orders completed through COD (cash on delivery), Fordeal found offline partners to increase the payment fulfillment rate.
According to data from 36kr, Fordeal currently has around 10 million monthly active users and 3 million cumulative transaction users. The average order value per customer in the Middle East is around US$100. After obtaining financing, Fordeal's expansion will be further accelerated, and the user scale is believed to continue to expand!
Fordeal is currently in a period of rapid expansion, with approximately 1,000 employees, and is recruiting for approximately 200 positions through various channels.
As a platform, Fordeal's main income comes from platform commissions. Fordeal is currently recruiting sellers, and the categories of investment include women's clothing, men's clothing, shoes, 3C, beauty, accessories, mother and baby, home furnishings, bags, stationery, etc. Fordeal has put a lot of effort into language localization. Sellers do not need customer service or understand the local language of the Middle East. Currently there is no commission for entry.
Therefore, for factories and sellers who are interested in the Middle East market, it is worth considering to settle in Fordeal now!
