Dubai, United Arab Emirates - Wednesday, December 17th 2014 [ME NewsWire]

Altibbi, the leading Arab Medical Online Interactive Platform which serves more than 5 million unique visitors a month and oversees more than 5000 interactions a month between a network of over 1,500 verified physicians and users, has closed a round of an undisclosed amount with leading regional investors.

The round included strategic and regional investors such as Middle East Venture Partners (MEVP) a pan Arab fund and DASH Ventures from Jordan, among other investors with industry insights and domain expertise.

Altibbi, still in its infancy, has created real momentum and growth over the past few years, and this investment round will strengthen monetization, accelerate revenue growth, and expand the reach of Altibbi’s brand.

Altibbi’s efforts to empower the Arabic speaking population have been recognised, and the app was awarded the WSA-mobile Award as the best mobile Health medical content for 2014.  Altibbi has also been one of the world’s top 40 apps in mobile content brilliance, shining a light on mobile innovation in Health and Medicine.

Altibbi will also be honored at the global UN-based World Summit Award mobile (WSA mobile) in February, 1-3, along with some of the world’s best mobile app developers, at the WSA mobile Global Congress in Abu Dhabi. Selected from over 480 mobile app developers from over 100 countries, Altibbi was chosen for the the Health and Medicine category by an international jury.

Jalil Allabadi, Managing Partner of Altibbi said that this is great news for Altibbi and its users round the Arab world “bringing strategic investors onboard is crucial to support our efforts in connecting the maximum number of users with the maximum number of medical experts through our  #1 Arabic medical interactive platform. The WSA-mobile award has come to emphasize and reinforce our leading position in the mHealth industry in the Arab world”.

Commenting, Majed Al Suwaidi, Managing Director of Dubai Internet City and Dubai Outsource Zone said;

 “Congratulations to Altibbi for being named one of the winners of the UN-based World Summit Awards. The awards celebrate the best of mobile innovation, and Altibbi is championing this innovation by creating high quality online medical content and changing the way users are able to connect with healthcare experts. Through in5, we are committed to supporting start-ups and entrepreneurs right from an idea through to the implementation of a product or service, and Altibbi is testament to the top talent and creativity that we have within our offering. I wish them all the best for the World Summit Awards in February.”Altibbi is the largest Arabic medical online platform, which empowers 350 million strong Arabic speaking population with educational and informative medical content in the form of articles, videos, and infographics, as well as giving users the opportunity and the ability to connect with healthcare experts from around the region. Altibbi has helped to improve many lives with more than 200,000 answers by top medical experts using the platform, and  has been visited by more than 40million people since January 2014.

With a young team of medical experts and engineers, Altibbi has started attracting major talent such as Dr. Amer Zureikat who has a long career between pharmaceutical marketing and online operations, as Vice President at Bayt.com, to take the company to the next level of growth.

Altibbi has already launched 5 mobile apps on both IOs and Android with downloads totaling 2million. “73% of our user base is already on mobile” says Dr. Zureikat “and this is placing an increasing pressure to be on mobile and targeting different audiences and offer them personalized, immediate, interactive and private medical interactions with trusted physicians from the Arab World”.

About Altibbi.com

Altibbi.com is the Arab world’s foremost resource on health. With more than 1.5 million pages of original Arabic content that cover more than 90 medical areas, it is by far the largest mobile and web platform for Arabic medical and health related information and communication. Altibbi serves more than 5 million unique visitors a month and oversees more than 5000 interactions a month between a network of more than 1,500 verified physicians and users. The site has more than more than one million Facebook fans. It receives about 300 queries a day and serves more than 12,000 physicians who cover 50 medical and heath specializations.

Read more about Altibbi.com at www.altibbi.com

About World Summit Award-mobile

The World Summit Award Mobile is a global initiative within the framework of, and in cooperation with, the United Nations World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), in collaboration with UNESCO, UNIDO and UN GAID. The WSA-mobile is the only ICT event worldwide, that reaches the mobile community in over 170 countries. Abu Dhabi, as the city of the award’s key partner ADSIC (Abu Dhabi Systems & Information Centre), is host for all WSA-mobile Awards. Read more About WAS-mobile at www.wsa-mobile.org

About In5:

The In5 Technology Innovation Centre, launched by Dubai Internet City http://www.dic.ae/, aims to foster and promote entrepreneurship and innovation in order to further develop the technology start-up ecosystem in Dubai and the region. In5 provides infrastructure, support and a dynamic and engaging working environment to entrepreneurs from the early stages of idea creation through to idea implementation and the commercial launch of a product or service. It provides entrepreneurs with mentoring, training, networking opportunities and access to funding and is open to entrepreneurs of all nationalities wishing to start-up in the areas of ICT, mobile and digital media. Read more about In5 at www.in5.ae

About DASH Ventures:

DASH Ventures Ltd. (DASH) is a Jordan-based early stage boutique venture capital firm that launched in October 2011 as a private partnership of entrepreneurs and operators applying their wealth of experience, expertise, and mentorship to helping founders and entrepreneurial teams build great sustainable companies.

DASH focuses primarily on seed and early-stage opportunities, across the Arab World and beyond, where it can add value most to strategy and business development, with selective investments in expansion-stage companies and regional companies seeking to expand globally.

DASH’s existing portfolio of investments covers a variety of sectors including Renewable Energy & Clean Technology, Online/Web Services, Consumer Internet, Software, and Digital Media & Entertainment, which include both B2C and B2B business models.

About Middle East Venture Partners (MEVP)

MEVP is a Middle East-focused venture capital firm that invests in the early and growth stages of innovative companies run by talented entrepreneurs primarily, but not exclusively, the Middle East Region (focus on Arab speaking countries such as the GCC countries and Levant region).

 With offices in Beirut, Dubai and Silicon Valley and more than USD 75 million in Assets under Management, MEVP is the largest and most established VC firm in this region, with clear cross border investment appetite.

Read more about MEVP at www.mevp.com  

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