Egyptian online ticketing startup KNOT raises $1 M Pre-seed funding from A15
In order to expand its AI-native ticketing and access control infrastructure, Egyptian startup KNOT Technologies has raised a US $1 million pre-seed round led by A15.
Ahmed Abdalla and Hussein ElBendak founded KNOT in 2025 with the goal of developing an AI-native ticketing and access control system to combat fraud, enhance demand visibility, and minimize leakage into unregulated resale markets.
The company’s strategy, which centers on an AI layer that controls distribution, tracks demand in real time, and authenticates identity, aims to rebuild identity, distribution, and value flow in live events.
With the announcement of its US$1 million pre-seed round led by A15, KNOT is coming out of stealth after securing more than 50 enterprise clients.
Product development, global expansion, and deeper integrations throughout the live events ecosystem will all be supported by the funding.
“Ticketing has become a financial black hole, with value leaking into unregulated channels and no modern tools to prevent it. Organisers lack visibility and control and fans are paying the price. That is why we started KNOT, to unlock real economic value and rebuild trust between businesses and their customers,” Abdalla said.
“The technical challenge here is significant, which is what makes it so compelling. Fraud today is constantly adapting. Staying ahead of that requires engineering for resilience, not just scale, and building systems that learn faster than the threats they face. As we scale, the underlying technology has the potential to create value far beyond ticketing,” said ElBendak.
According to A15, the business fills a structural void in a market dominated by companies that were established prior to the advent of mobile and artificial intelligence.
“We invested in KNOT because the team is tackling a complex global problem with a genuinely novel approach. Their technology has the potential to reshape how trust and identity work in ticketing, and we believe they are uniquely positioned to lead this transformation,” said Karim Beshara, founder and managing partner at A15.
