mamun raises $3 million to expand Gulf-Asia trade finance

By Olivia Hart

mamun raised $3 million in a seed round led by Phaze Ventures through its Oman Fund, with Jasoor Ventures participating. The company describes itself as a Sharia-compliant trade finance platform, and the Wednesday announcement did not disclose valuation, investor ownership or the round's other commercial terms.

What does the $3 million fund?

In a Wednesday statement, mamun said the proceeds would “scale its artificial intelligence (AI)-based origination and underwriting” between the Greater Bay Area, Oman and the UAE. The announcement did not disclose shipment volumes, revenue, deployment milestones or assets under management, leaving the scale of the expansion undefined.

The capital supports mamun's stated plan to expand across a corridor connecting Asian and Gulf markets. The round buys expansion capacity, but the public terms do not define its pace.

Why does payment timing matter?

An exporter in Muscat that ships today may wait 60-90 days for payment, mamun said. Banks often refuse to bridge that interval because small exporters lack long financial track records. That gap is the commercial problem mamun says it finances.

The Asian Development Bank estimates the global trade finance gap at S$2.5 trillion. It also estimates that 41 percent of SME trade finance applications receive a rejection, a rate equivalent to nearly two in five applications. The announcement did not identify the year or methodology of the ADB estimates, limiting independent comparison.

For mamun, the addressable need appears large, but demand alone does not demonstrate investor demand for its platform. The service will matter only if investors fund screened trades at acceptable credit losses.

How does mamun screen a trade?

mamun assesses the company behind each trade before presenting the opportunity to investors. Its inputs include:

• The company
• The shipment
• The contract
• The buyer
• The trade documents
• The history between the parties

After that assessment, mamun lists the trade for investors on its platform. The company says its origination engine “finds and screens trades as they form,” reducing the interval between a deal emerging and an investor seeing it. mamun disclosed no weighting for the inputs, nor any approval, default or recovery data.

The workflow makes mamun's screening central to the proposition. It also leaves investors dependent on an AI model whose performance the announcement does not quantify.

How does mamun cross two legal systems?

mamun says cross-border trade is harder because each transaction spans two regulators, two banking systems and two legal regimes. That complexity has led the company to build an operation across the corridor rather than concentrate only on domestic lending.

The company bases its home and origination operations in Muscat under the Financial Services Authority's crowdfunding framework. It also has entities in Abu Dhabi and Hong Kong, and its licence allows mamun to bring in investors from inside and outside Oman and finance businesses in both places.

About 40 percent of mamun's trade finance settlements already clear through Hong Kong-based institutions and businesses, or roughly two in five. The company did not provide the underlying transaction count, so the claim shows corridor activity without revealing its scale.

What does Oman's trade data show?

mamun cites Oman's non-oil exports, which rose about 10 percent in the first seven months of 2026. Re-exports rose 13.6 percent over the same period, and the company identifies the UAE as Oman's largest non-oil trading partner.

The export figures support mamun's argument that more cross-border activity can create more financing needs. They do not establish how much of that activity lacks bank funding, and mamun supplied no absolute export values or transaction denominator for its Hong Kong settlement share. Trade growth creates an opening, but the size of mamun's serviceable gap remains unmeasured.

Who is backing mamun?

Phaze Ventures was founded in 2018 and describes itself as Oman's oldest private venture capital firm. It invests through the Oman Fund in homegrown, AI-enabled Omani businesses, matching mamun's technology focus and Oman base.

Jasoor Ventures is based in the Abu Dhabi Global Market and invests across the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey. That geographic reach extends mamun's stated network, although the announcement did not specify the amount, ownership stake or board rights attached to Jasoor's investment.

The two investors bring relevant regional mandates, but their backing does not substitute for evidence of mamun's underwriting record. The round establishes who supplied capital, not how that capital translates into returns.

What must mamun prove next?

The funding addresses a defined customer problem: small exporters can face two to three months between shipment and payment. mamun's model depends on converting those gaps into investable trades, screening them accurately and settling them across the Hong Kong-Oman-UAE corridor.

The next proof points are approval rates, default losses, investor returns and settlement growth, none of which mamun disclosed. The absence matters because the ADB rejection estimate describes unmet demand, not proof that mamun can price that demand safely.

If mamun can demonstrate repeat funding at acceptable credit losses, the $3 million seed round could build a durable platform across the corridor. Until then, the cheque buys a test of AI-led trade underwriting across multiple banking and legal systems.