News
Taager Secures $6.75M To Expand Social eCommerce In MENA
The Pre-Series B funding round was led by Norrsken22 and will allow the company to enhance the platform while strengthening its data tools and team.
Riyadh-based social eCommerce platform Taager has successfully raised $6.75 million in a Pre-Series B funding round. The investment, led by Africa-focused growth fund Norrsken22, will help the company expand its operations further across the Middle East.
Taager allows would-be entrepreneurs to start their own dropshipping business, providing products, storage, shipping, and customer collection. However, unlike traditional platforms, Taager specializes in “social eCommerce” — a business model where products are bought and sold directly through social media platforms.
Social commerce merges online shopping with social interactions, significantly reshaping traditional online customer journeys. Globally, social eCommerce is projected to generate $2.5 trillion in revenue this year. In the MENA, it has already surpassed $14 billion, accounting for over 30% of all eCommerce sales.
Although MENA’s young, tech-savvy population is already purchasing products via social eCommerce, would-be entrepreneurs often face challenges starting a business in the region. Supply chains are complex, capital is limited, and gaining insights into the diverse range of consumer bases can be tough.
Taager tackles these pain points by offering an all-in-one platform that provides sellers with access to trending products, pricing and marketing insights, logistics solutions, embedded financing, and multi-market payment processing.
Also Read: Top E-Commerce Websites In The Middle East In 2025
Leveraging data gathered from thousands of merchants and millions of customers, Taager also uses machine learning to enhance product recommendations, optimize pricing, and predict buyer behavior. The company is also integrating generative AI into its operations, using AI-driven sales agents to improve efficiency while keeping costs in check.
The eventual goal is to establish Taager as a central hub for demand generation and data-driven decision-making in MENA’s social eCommerce ecosystem. Mohamed Elhorishy, Taager’s Co-founder and CEO, emphasized the company’s ambitious mission: “Our goal is to make it possible for anyone to launch and scale a successful social eCommerce business. We support women, young entrepreneurs, and low-income individuals in building sustainable sources of income. On average, Taager merchants have seen a 2.5x increase in profitability. Our platform has helped thousands achieve financial independence and stability”.
So far, Taager has supported over 45,000 online social sellers. With this latest round of funding, the company plans to strengthen its data tools, expand its product offerings, and grow its expert team to accelerate its regional impact.
News
Nano Banana 2 Arrives In MENA For Google Gemini Users
Google brings its latest image model to Gemini and Search, adding 4K output and tighter text control for regional users.
Google has opened access to Nano Banana 2 across the Middle East and North Africa, pushing its newest image model into everyday tools rather than keeping it inside the exclusive (and expensive) Pro tier.
The rollout spans the Google Gemini desktop and mobile apps, and extends to Google Search through Lens and AI Mode. Developers can also test it in preview via AI Studio and the Gemini API.
Nano Banana 2 runs on Gemini Flash, Google’s fast inference layer. The focus is speed, but also control. Users can export visuals from 512px up to 4K, adjusting aspect ratios for everything from vertical social posts to widescreen displays.
The model maintains character likeness across up to five figures and preserves fidelity for as many as 14 objects within a single workflow. This enables visual continuity across scenes, iterations, or edits — supporting projects like short films, storyboards, and multi-scene narratives. Text rendering has also been improved, delivering legible typography in mockups and greeting cards, with built-in translation and localization directly within images.
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Under the hood, the system taps Gemini’s broader knowledge base and pulls in real-time information and imagery from web search to render specific subjects more accurately. Lighting and fine detail have been upgraded, without slowing output.
By embedding the model inside Gemini and Search, Google is normalizing advanced image generation for a mass audience. In MENA, where startups and marketing teams are leaning heavily on AI to scale content across languages and borders, that shift lands at a practical moment.
The move also folds creative tooling deeper into search itself, so that image generation is no longer a separate workflow. It now sits right next to the query box.
