Comfi Raises US$65M Pre-Series A Led by Iliad Partners, with First Regional Investments from Yango Ventures and Raw Ventures

Comfi, a B2B embedded finance platform, has raised US$65 million in a Pre-Series A
funding round consisting of both equity and debt.

The equity round was led by Iliad Partners and joined by Yango Ventures and Raw
Ventures, both making their first investment in the region.

The round includes a credit facility from Partners for Growth and a mezzanine facility
structured by Shorooq, with participation from a notable family office.

The new funding will support Comfi’s next stage of growth, including scaling its
underwriting and risk capabilities, expanding its product offering, and accelerating
growth across key regional markets.

“Every investor in this round saw a different opportunity, and that’s exactly what made
the structure work,” says Comfi’s co-founder and CEO Sanjar Samiev. “The venture
debt and credit facility players saw a clear path to originating high volumes of capital
securely through Comfi and earning their yield. The equity investors saw the growth
trajectory and wanted to be in the same boat early. These aren’t conflicting motivations,
they’re complementary ones.”

“What the structure ultimately gives us is freedom. We can grow aggressively for the
next 18 months without the pressure of an imminent raise, and we have the time and
resources to build toward a significantly larger round from a position of strength, not
necessity.”

Founded in 2023 and headquartered in the UAE, Comfi was established by Samiev,
Alisher Akbarov, Amal Abdullaev, and Denis Gavrilin. It has processed over 15,000
invoices, works with 4,000+ finance leaders, and serves more than 1,000 clients,
reflecting growing demand for fast, flexible SME capital solutions across the region.

SMEs across the region face prolonged B2B payment cycles that restrict cash flow and
access to working capital. Comfi addresses this with a B2B Buy Now, Pay Later solution
that enables up to 90-day terms while paying suppliers within 24 hours.

For Samiev, building a B2B embedded finance platform came down to overcoming three
distinct hurdles: regulation, security, and scalability.

“On regulation, the honest answer is we didn’t get everything right from day one,” he says. “The legal framework for embedded finance in the GCC isn’t a clean rulebook you can read and implement. We figured out our model through traction, through conversations, and through the right network connections. Iteration was the strategy, not perfection from the outset.

“Security had its own learning curve. One early example: we didn’t initially appreciate
the meaningful operational difference between how cheques and UAE Direct Debits
execute as collection instruments. The mechanics look similar on paper but behave very
differently in practice. We only truly understood those nuances by experiencing the edge
cases firsthand. That kind of knowledge can’t be borrowed from a textbook.”

According to Samiev, scalability was the most complex hurdle, as B2B trade in the GCC
remains rooted in decades-old trust networks and informal credit arrangements that
existed well before fintech. “Introducing a new way of financing into that fabric required
patience. What helped us enormously is that UAE’s B2B ecosystem is tightly connected,
networks are dense and word travels fast,” he explains. “And critically, our product was
designed to complement and formalize what suppliers were already doing informally.
When your product imitates existing behavior rather than replacing it, adoption follows
naturally.”

He says that AI has significantly accelerated Comfi’s analytical and operational
capabilities, enabling its underwriting engine to process proprietary, public, and financial
data in near real time, reducing hours of manual credit analysis to minutes. “Where
human expertise has remained non-negotiable is anywhere the product touches
relationships, judgment under ambiguity, and trust,” Samiev adds. “The GCC B2B
market operates on context that models don’t yet capture well: who a buyer actually is
beyond their financials, whether a supplier relationship is genuinely sticky, how to read
signals that don’t show up in data. Our risk team, account managers, and BDMs carry
institutional knowledge that no AI deployment has replaced. They’re not checking AI’s
output, they’re the layer that makes the output actionable. The honest balance is: AI
gives us scale, humans give us accuracy where it matters most.

‘TREP TALK: Comfi co-founder Sanjar Samiev on navigating equity and debt
funding in today’s GCC landscape

Enter debt negotiations from a position of expertise, not desperation. “Debt investors will impose covenants. Some of those covenants, if accepted without scrutiny, will constrain how you actually run the business. Know your operational red lines before you sit down. Push back early. Concessions made in a term sheet are very hard to reverse once you’re 12 months into a facility.”

Don’t overpay for debt right now. “Rates reflect regional risk sentiment and that sentiment is elevated. If your burn allows it, wait. The current tension will subside, and the difference between a facility secured today versus in a few months could be material to your unit economics for years. Cheap debt is a competitive advantage — expensive debt is a tax on your model.”

Raise equity for new bets, debt for proven ones. “Debt works when it’s financing a repeatable business line with predictable economics. It is the wrong instrument for testing new verticals or unproven product lines. Make sure your equity round gives you enough room — at a valuation you’re comfortable with — to run experiments that your debt facility will never cover.” Align instrument to investor motivation, not just your need. “The best capital structures emerge when each investor is optimized for what they actually want. Yield-seeking debt investors want security, volume, and predictable repayment. Equity investors want growth, moat, and optionality. Pitch them differently. Structure accordingly. Mixing the two audiences in the same conversation creates noise.”

Build your debt relationships before you need them. “In the GCC, trust precedes term sheets. Debt investors here want to understand your business over time, not in a two-week sprint. Start those conversations six months before you need capital, share data proactively, and let them build conviction at their own pace. The founders who close debt facilities quickly are almost always the ones who started the relationship long before they needed the money.”