News

Ovasave Empowers Women To Tackle Difficult Fertility Choices

The UAE-based startup helps women to test their fertility at home and connects them to a network of clinics offering egg-freezing procedures.

Published

2 years ago

August 28, 2023

Nour Nasir

Ovasave

Abu Dhabi-based Ovasave is on a mission to empower women to take control of their fertility. Founded by Torkia Mahloul and Majd Abu Zant, the startup seeks to ease the complexity of freezing eggs while encouraging women to start testing their ovarian reserves at thirty years of age to improve their chances of becoming pregnant in the future.

Ovasave’s digitized process is centered around a $100 FDA-approved self-administered home hormone test, followed by a remote consultation by a doctor from a vetted fertility clinic network. Depending on the results and the consultation outcome, patients can opt for an egg-freezing package from one of the clinics in the network.

ovasave home testing kit

“Access to fertility services is a major issue. Women are delaying having children, so their fertility is declining, but they are not acting on it because of a lack of awareness […] and because the fertility journey is fragmented and complex,” Ms Mahloul says.

Recent changes to reproductive health laws in the United Arab Emirates now allow single and married women to preserve eggs for both social and medical reasons (including pursuing education or career advancement or undergoing cancer treatments).

According to co-founder Abu Zant, freezing eggs costs around Dh25,000 per cycle, with storage averaging another Dh1,500 per year. In the UAE, frozen eggs can be legally stored for five years, with an option to extend by an additional five years.

Also Read: LVL Wellbeing Receives $10 Million Investment To Scale Operations

Ovasave is partnering with eight UAE fertility clinics and twenty IVF specialists. Users will be able to rate doctors so that other women can compare the reviews when they book a consultation.

So far, the co-founders have invested $400,000 into the startup and are seeking to raise up to $2 million over the coming six months. The funds will be used for technical development, recruitment, and general market growth.

News

Dirham-Backed Stablecoin DDSC Enters Live Phase In UAE

Central Bank approval moves the dirham-backed token into deployment, targeting regulated payments and settlement flows.

Published

4 days ago

February 13, 2026

Nour Nasir

dirham-backed stablecoin ddsc enters live phase in uae

The UAE has cleared the launch of DDSC, a dirham-backed stablecoin now entering live operation after approval from the Central Bank. The move pushes the project beyond its pilot phase and into the country’s regulated financial system.

The token is backed by a consortium led by IHC, Sirius International Holding and First Abu Dhabi Bank (FAB), framing it as an institutional instrument rather than a consumer crypto product. DDSC was first announced in April 2025, but regulatory clearance now allows deployment and integration across approved channels.

DDSC runs on ADI Chain, a Layer 2 blockchain built by the Abu Dhabi-based ADI Foundation. The infrastructure is designed for governance and performance requirements expected by large institutions, linking blockchain settlement with existing compliance and oversight frameworks.

The focus is practical, targeting treasury settlements, high-value payments, trade and supply-chain transactions, and programmable financial flows for regulated entities. FAB plans to offer access to the token through approved platforms for its clients, keeping the rollout inside controlled banking environments.

“DDSC marks a defining milestone in the UAE’s digital finance journey,” said Syed Basar Shueb, CEO of IHC. “With the Central Bank’s approval and our transition into live operation, we are delivering trusted, institutional-grade infrastructure that strengthens resilience, accelerates innovation, and expands what is possible in regulated digital payments”.

Also Read: Basatne Debuts ORBT Platform For Digital Refunds In UAE

FAB says the project reflects how stablecoins can sit within traditional finance when risk controls are built in from the outset. “This milestone underscores that stablecoins can be integrated responsibly into the financial system when built to meet rigorous regulatory and risk requirements,” said Futoon Hamdan AlMazrouei, Group Head of Personal, Business, Wealth and Privileged Client Banking Group at FAB.

The launch reinforces the UAE’s strategy of pushing digital finance through regulation instead of open-ended crypto experimentation. Stablecoins in this model are positioned less as trading assets and more as programmable extensions of national currency, aimed at institutional scale and government use cases.