Despite a global decline in venture capital funding in 2024, three founders are taking a different tack by turning their bootstrapped startup into a $350 million exit. Disrupt.com, a venture capital firm based in the United Arab Emirates, today announced a $100 million commitment to develop and support AI-first technology ventures worldwide.
Disrupt.com is the result of the founders’ successful 2022 exit from cloud hosting platform Cloudways to US-listed Digital Ocean Holdings. It was founded by three college friends who grew up in the same home: Aaqib, Uzair, and Umair Gadit. The $350 million deal was the biggest exit in Pakistan’s tech industry to date, and the founders are now using their UAE headquarters to reinvest their capital and entrepreneurial experience back into the ecosystem through a novel venture-building strategy.
This new $100 million commitment marks a significant expansion of their venture-building activities, which have already deployed over $40 million across their portfolio, including in four growth-stage companies built from the idea stage, seven investments in early-stage companies, and an exit valued at $350 million. Disrupt.com, which employs more than 650 professionals, offers startups not only funding but also the operational and technical know-how they require to grow.
“Now is the time to be doubling down on our experience, financial investment and commitment required to help build the next wave of startups that will shape the future of the world as we know it. With Web 3.0 in its infancy and AI storming into our lives, the opportunity to problem-solve and create businesses that will fit the needs of how people live and work is up for the taking. Our region can not only keep up but also lead the way. We are excited to see where this journey will take us,” said founding partner Aaqib Gadit.
Disrupt.com, in contrast to conventional venture capital firms, uses three strategies to generate value: establishing their own startups from the ground up, co-founding ventures with outside founders, and strategically investing in VC funds and early-stage startups. Their distinct ‘CoBuild’ model allows them to act as fractional co-founders, offering specialized engineering, go-to-market, and operations teams to promote early adoption in a way that uses the least amount of capital.
The $100 million investment from the company focuses on five key areas: retail innovation, Web 3.0, cybersecurity, automotive technology, and artificial intelligence as a cross-cutting theme. Instead of going after growth at all costs, Disrupt.com focuses on pre-seed to Series A stage startups that show clear routes to profitability and strong organic growth potential.
Magnitt reports that MENA venture capital investment fell 29% to just under $2 billion in 2024, coinciding with the announcement of a dramatic decline in regional funding. Early-stage ventures faced a difficult environment as funding for Saudi startups fell 44% to $750 million, while funding for UAE startups fell 8% to $613 million.
The success of Disrupt.com’s model is demonstrated by their current portfolio, which includes US-based fitness apparel company Squatwolf, cybersecurity startup PureSquare, and Web3.0 platform ZigChain, which has grown to 500,000+ users and hundreds of millions in managed assets. In a number of AI-focused startups, such as the organizational transformation platform Agentnoon and the climate action scaling tool Ahya, the company has already invested money as a strategic investor.
Bartolome R. Bordallo, Co-Founder & CEO of ZigChain, highlighted the venture builder’s distinctive approach: “Some investors write checks. Disrupt.com builds with you. They’ve helped us scale from a few early adopters to managing hundreds of millions in assets and launching our own blockchain.”
Anam Khalid and Wajdan Gul, co-founders of UAE-based fitness apparel brand Squatwolf, emphasise the founder-first approach: “With Disrupt, you get founder-friendly partners because they’re founders themselves. They understand our challenges and opportunities in a way traditional investors simply cannot.”
Disrupt.com will focus its $100 million investment on projects that have a solid product-market fit, a well-thought-out idea-market alignment, and strong unit economics that indicate profitability.
