AI is altering how we store on-line, making our experiences extra personalised. Sensible assistants suggest merchandise, negotiate offers, and even deal with customer support. Massive retailers and smaller companies are utilizing AI to enhance search, provide chains, and checkout.
If AI corporations (and their traders) have their means, procuring will quickly be targeted on chatting with an assistant, with companies automating all the things behind the scenes.
Dubai-based Qeen.ai (stylized as qeen.ai) is working to make this a actuality within the Center East and past. The startup has raised $10 million to scale its platform, which offers autonomous AI brokers for e-commerce companies.
Prosus Ventures, a significant e-commerce investor, led the seed spherical, which isn’t solely one of many largest within the Center East’s AI business however in MENA total. The VC believes Qeen.ai is well-positioned to deliver AI-driven automation to retailers as AI brokers reshape on-line marketplaces.
Founders Morteza Ibrahimi (CEO), Ahmad Khwlieh (CTO), and Dina Alsamhan (CBO) began Qeen after years of engaged on AI at Google and DeepMind.
Ibrahimi, in an interview with Trendster, stated that they honed in on e-commerce partially opportunistically: all three had labored at Google Advertisements in varied roles throughout their time with the search large, and so they noticed first-hand how different alums constructed extremely profitable e-commerce companies. On high of their AI experience, the trio knew how you can run advertisements and optimize website positioning exceptionally effectively and thought it might be a robust mixture.
Google and DeepMind background
E-commerce has been steadily rising for years, however other than sure spikes (notably throughout vacation durations) it nonetheless accounts for between 15% and 20% of retail gross sales (even in a mature market just like the U.S. it was solely simply over 16% at of the final quarter, per the U.S. Census Bureau).
Qeen’s thesis is that this might develop if the e-commerce processes have been run higher. Success in e-commerce, they believed, ought to be about nice merchandise and operational effectivity — not simply who can recreation the advert system finest. That perception led them to construct a platform that helps e-commerce sellers develop with out counting on advertisements as their major driver.
The worldwide e-commerce market is increasing quick, pushed by altering client conduct, digital funds, and higher logistics. In MENA, the market is predicted to hit $50 billion by 2025, with Saudi Arabia and the UAE main the expansion.
Qeen.ai is tapping into this growth by creating AI-powered advertising brokers designed for e-commerce companies throughout MENA. These absolutely automated brokers deal with content material creation, advertising, and conversational gross sales, permitting small and mid-sized retailers to compete with out counting on costly companies or deep advert experience.
In contrast to conventional options, Qeen’s AI repeatedly learns from client interactions utilizing its proprietary RL-UI expertise, refining advertising methods in real-time for higher outcomes.
From Google advertisements to AI-driven e-commerce
Whereas AI-powered gross sales and customer support instruments typically wrestle with excessive churn charges, as companies continuously change platforms, Qeen.ai claims to see stronger retention in e-commerce and advertising. Ibrahimi attributes this to how deeply Qeen’s AI brokers combine into retailers’ workflows, making them a core a part of day by day operations slightly than a replaceable software.
A key characteristic driving engagement is dynamic textual content personalization, which adjusts content material primarily based on consumer conduct and gadget sort. For instance, an iPhone consumer may see product particulars in bullet factors for fast studying, whereas a laptop computer consumer will get an in depth paragraph.
Since launching its Dynamic Content material agent in Q2 2024, Qeen.ai has served over 15 million customers, generated 1 million SKU descriptions, and helped retailers improve gross sales by 30%, in accordance with the corporate.
“We labored with a consumer to optimize their content material and website positioning. After utilizing our AI plugins, their search quantity elevated by 40%, and their Google rating improved from 22 to 18—all with zero guide effort. All the course of was absolutely autonomous,” stated Ibrahimi, giving one other occasion the place Qeen’s AI capabilities have shone.
Qeen employs a subscription-based pricing mannequin and incorporates value-based pricing, a rising development in AI companies. Presently, Qeen generates income by two subscription fashions: content material automation, the place companies pay per lively SKU, sometimes $0.10 to $0.20 per SKU per thirty days. Then its AI advertising agent whose pricing is predicated on per-interaction quantity.
Ibrahimi declined to reveal the variety of companies utilizing Qeen, in addition to income development metrics. Notable purchasers embody Dubai Retailer, sixth Road, and Jumia.
Standing out… with expertise
Ibrahimi left DeepMind in early 2023 to co-found the startup. That very same yr, the corporate raised a $2 million pre-seed spherical earlier than launching its product in June 2024. With its latest $10 million seed spherical, qeen has raised a complete of $12 million in below a yr.
Throughout this time, AI-powered advertising brokers have gained traction worldwide, with a number of startups, notably within the U.S. and Europe, coming into the area. Opponents like YC-backed Uncommon and Rankai are tackling related challenges, so how does Qeen stand out?
Nicely, for one, most of those AI startups deal with developed markets, whereas Qeen as a substitute is prioritizing the Center East first—a area largely underserved by AI-driven advertising automation instruments. In keeping with Ibrahimi, Qeen will serve small companies throughout MENA, set up a robust foothold, after which develop globally.
Deep tech experience and a robust expertise pool give Qeen an edge over new entrants, the chief govt added. Two of its co-founders earned PhDs in AI over a decade in the past, lengthy earlier than AI grew to become mainstream. Ibrahimi himself beforehand led a DeepMind analysis workforce specializing in self-learning, goal-driven AI brokers—the identical expertise that now powers Qeen.
“One of the crucial thrilling issues we’ve seen is the standard of AI expertise right here,” Ibrahimi stated. “We’ve attracted nice expertise each regionally and internationally—folks have left the Bay Space, Europe, and the UK to return right here and construct with us.”
Qeen.ai presently employs over 25 folks throughout the UAE and Jordan.
The seed funding will assist qeen’s development technique by increasing its AI platform, scaling its workforce, and attracting extra prospects, it stated. Wamda Capital, 10X Founders Fund, and Dara Holdings are among the many different traders on this spherical.
