Egypt-based AI recruitment company, Talents Arena, has raised a $750,000 pre-Seed funding round from UI Investments, alongside several Saudi and regional angel investors.
Founded in 2019 by Aya Elgebeely, Talents Arena uses an AI-powered hiring engine to help organisations hire talent by fully automating the recruitment life cycle.
This funding round comes as the company is rapidly becoming a pioneering force in the AI recruitment industry, playing a critical role in bridging the unemployment gap in the Middle East and Africa region.
Talents Arena is not only a Flat6Labs portfolio business but also a former participant in the famed Plug & Play startup accelerator programme. The company’s success in obtaining this pre-seed capital shows that investors have a high level of faith in the large market opportunity in the Middle East.
Talents Arena has successfully made more than 180,000 job matches and placed thousands of candidates in suitable tech jobs, using its unique talent mining engine and automation features. The new funds will be channelled towards Talents Arena’s expansion plans into Saudi Arabia and the GCC.
“Our talent mining engine leverages advanced algorithms and machine learning models that draw upon hundreds of thousands of human decisions to find hidden gems in the talent market and match them with suitable vacancies. This, in return, automates and streamlines the hiring process for both employers and job seekers,” said Aya Elgebeely, Founder and CEO of Talents Arena.
The Middle East and Africa region has 6 million unfilled jobs, according to the World Employment and Social Outlook 2020 Report from the International Labour Organisation. Due to the protracted hiring process, rapid technological advancements, and intense competition for top-tier technology candidates, IT recruiters and HR professionals are having difficulty finding the ideal match for their jobs.
Talents Arena’s AI engine aims to disrupt traditional hiring practices by significantly reducing time-to-hire, improving job matchmaking, and enabling startups, corporates and governments to monitor and optimise their hiring process and meet hiring KPIs. By bringing technological advancement to recruitment, the company is set to become the go-to recruitment solution for companies in the Middle Eastern market and beyond.
“This funding milestone enables us to accelerate the development of our AI hiring engine and expand our footprint in the Saudi market that already accounts for 25% of our client base,” Elgebeely added. “We are excited to bring our cutting-edge technology to businesses across industries in Saudi Arabia and the Middle East, helping hiring managers and recruiters find talents faster with higher accuracy and at a better economic value.”