We made it to the front page of Al Mal, Egypt’s leading finance newspaper
Ibrahim Abdel Rahim was interviewed by Al Mal, the Egyptian finance newspaper, in its weekly issue of 20 November 2022. The article, headlined “Moon base targets first close worth €5 million,” was written by Mahmoud Gamal and featured on the front page.
In the interview, Ibrahim set out Moonbase’s fund, its size and timeline, and its approach to investing in small and mid-sized companies.
Key takeaways
- First close of €5M targeted within days. Ibrahim said the fund was set up that year, has a target size of €15M and a minimum investment of €500K.
- A direct-investment model. The fund takes stakes in small and mid-sized companies, helps them grow, then exits after 5–7 years by selling to another investor or listing part of the shares on the stock exchange.
- Around 30% average return. Ibrahim put the average return on SME investments at about 30%, and noted the idea had only begun to spread in the Egyptian market about a year earlier. Moonbase planned promotional tours in Egypt.
- Family SMEs and 25 target companies. The fund looks for family-run SMEs whose founders want to step back from management and exit. It aims to invest in 25 companies, starting in Europe and Asia, while some Egyptian businessmen were reviewing two small industrial companies.
- SMEs are the bulk of the economy. Ibrahim said SMEs make up about 80% of Egypt’s economy, and that the model of bringing in strategic investors originated in the US in the 1980s through Stanford, which publishes an annual index of returns.