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Naran, the Dubai-based mobility financing platform, has raised $10 million in equity and debt from Landel, a UAE-based investment firm.
The capital will support fleet scaling in Colombia, Peru, Senegal, and Côte d’Ivoire, as well as the company’s entry into new markets including MENA and the rollout of new FinTech products.
By 2030, Naran aims to operate across 10 countries, create 30,000 income opportunities, and deploy fleets of 10,000 cars and 20,000 motorcycles. A launch in Paraguay is planned for September 2026.
“We address a critical financing gap in emerging markets, where ride-hailing and delivery drivers can’t access traditional bank loans due to irregular income or limited credit histories. Our goal is to make vehicle ownership accessible to mobility entrepreneurs, helping them increase their income and build financial security. At the same time, we solve the biggest constraint for ride-hailing and delivery platforms in these markets: supply. Every vehicle we finance is an active driver added to our partners’ marketplaces,” said Bayaskhalan Alexeev, CEO and co-founder of Naran.
The announcement comes a few days after its Lagos-founded rival Moove, which is also headquartered in Dubai, raised $250 million in a Series C round at a $2.1 billion valuation. The round was led by Mubadala Investment Company and co-led by Woven Capital, Toyota’s growth fund, and Ion Pacific.
With this funding, the Dubai company aims to make a significant impact in Africa. In sub-Saharan Africa, nearly 88% of employment is informal, limiting access to vehicle financing.
In cities like Abidjan, mobility constraints are estimated to reduce national income by 4–5%. Yet ride-hailing is one of the most attractive jobs available: according to Oliver Wyman, drivers in Africa earn up to 130% more than workers in comparable-skill roles.
According to the company, the continent’s shared mobility market is expected to nearly double by 2030 to approximately $8 billion, creating more than 550,000 additional income opportunities.
Founded in 2025 by Bayaskhalan Alexeev and Alexander Gubarev, both former Yango executives who launched and scaled ride-hailing operations across Latin America and Africa, Naran provides rent-to-own financing for cars and motorcycles.
The company buys vehicles directly from manufacturers and offers independent drivers flexible terms ranging from 12 to 60 months, partnering with ride-hailing and delivery platforms including Yango and inDrive to put underbanked drivers on the road.
Naran has built its own fleet management system that handles driver onboarding, payment scheduling, utilisation tracking, telematics, and maintenance across all markets from a single platform.
Each contract also builds a driver’s first formal repayment history, which the company sees as the foundation for a broader line of asset-backed financial products beyond vehicles.
The company plans to open its technology stack to third-party fleet operators, offering fleet management software as a SaaS product, providing asset-backed debt financing for fleet expansion, and, in some cases, acquiring operators outright.
“Naran is a rare combination in emerging markets: an asset-backed business where every dollar deployed is secured by a revenue-generating, GPS-tracked vehicle, run by a team with deep operational experience in these exact markets. The model generates hard collateral, daily cash flows, and proven unit economics – and the fleet management infrastructure behind it makes the model scalable well beyond the company’s own fleet. We look forward to supporting Naran’s next phase of growth across Latin America and Africa,” said Aidar Musin, Managing Partner at Landel.
