UAE-based agri-fintech startup, Maalexi, has secured $2.8 million in an oversubscribed funding round led by Saudi-listed insurance giant Tawuniya. With participation from UAE venture capital firm Global Ventures, the company accelerates plans to build what it describes as the world’s first regulated real-world asset (RWA) agricultural exchange.
The investment marks a significant milestone for the Dubai-headquartered startup as it prepares for its Series A fundraising while scaling a technology platform designed to modernise global agricultural commodity trading.
By combining AI, the IoT, blockchain technology and tokenised real-world assets, Maalexi aims to address longstanding challenges in cross-border agricultural trade. This includes limited transparency, inconsistent quality verification, fragmented trading systems and inefficient settlement processes.
Founded in 2021 by Dr. Azam Pasha and Rohit Majhi, Maalexi currently operates across the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, India and Europe, positioning itself at the intersection of agriculture, financial technology and digital assets.
“This round marks an important milestone for Maalexi,” said Dr. Azam Pasha, the company’s co-founder and Chief Executive Officer. “Tawuniya’s leadership in this round reflects growing institutional confidence in our platform and in the opportunity to modernise agricultural trade infrastructure.
“Over the past three years, we have shown that physical agricultural trade can be verified, standardised and executed with lower risk. We are now building the exchange layer on top of that foundation,” he added.
A regulated marketplace for global agricultural trade
At the heart of Maalexi’s vision is the Maalexi Agricultural Assets Token Exchange (MAATEX), a platform the company says is designed to become the world’s first regulated exchange dedicated to agricultural real-world assets.
The exchange seeks to digitise ownership of verified agricultural commodities through tokenisation, allowing physical commodities to be represented securely on blockchain infrastructure while maintaining regulatory oversight.
According to the company, this approach is intended to make cross-border agricultural trading more transparent, standardised and accessible for buyers, sellers and financial institutions.
Rather than relying on traditional paperwork and fragmented verification processes, Maalexi intends to create a trusted digital ecosystem where agricultural commodities can be verified, traded and settled more efficiently.
The broader objective is to reduce operational risks while improving confidence across international agricultural supply chains.
Investors back infrastructure designed to strengthen market resilience
The funding round attracted strong institutional interest, with Saudi-listed insurer Tawuniya taking the lead alongside Global Ventures, signalling growing investor confidence in digital infrastructure for agricultural markets.
Explaining the rationale behind the investment, Tawuniya’s Chief Investment Officer, Fahad Bin Muammar, said the company believes Maalexi is addressing structural inefficiencies within global commodity markets.
“At Tawuniya, we back businesses that strengthen financial infrastructure and improve market resilience,” Bin Muammar said.
“Maalexi has built a disciplined, risk-focused platform that connects physical agricultural trade with emerging digital asset infrastructure. We believe its regulated exchange model can improve transparency, efficiency and market access across global agricultural trade,” he added.
The participation of institutional investors also highlights increasing confidence in technologies that bridge traditional industries with blockchain-based financial infrastructure while remaining within regulated environments.
Three years of operational growth lay the foundation
Maalexi said the exchange it is now developing is built on three years of operational experience in agricultural commodity trading rather than on a theoretical concept.
Over the past 36 months, the startup has established a verification and risk management system for physical agricultural trade across four markets, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, India and the United States.
During that period, the company recorded a 70 per cent customer repeat rate, executed more than 4,000 smart contracts and recorded those transactions on the Avalanche Layer-1 blockchain.
Beyond operational performance, the company has also focused heavily on innovation, publishing three patents with the United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO), while another three remain under review for publication this year.
According to Maalexi, these achievements provide the technological and operational foundation required to support a regulated agricultural exchange capable of handling international commodity transactions at scale.
Solving challenges in cross-border agricultural markets
Maalexi argues that global agricultural commodity markets have historically lacked a viable exchange model because the underlying trading ecosystem remains fragmented, difficult to verify and largely non-standardised.
By integrating AI-powered verification, IoT-enabled monitoring, blockchain-based recordkeeping and automated smart contracts, the company hopes to eliminate many of the inefficiencies that have traditionally characterised international agricultural trade.
These technologies enable commodities to be authenticated, transactions to be recorded transparently and settlements to be executed with reduced counterparty risk.
The company believes that tokenised real-world agricultural assets will ultimately make it easier for participants across the value chain to trade confidently while improving liquidity and expanding market access.
Positioning for long-term expansion
The latest equity investment builds on Maalexi’s financial momentum. In August 2025, the startup secured a Shariah-compliant credit facility worth up to $20 million from Amwal Capital Partner, providing additional financing to support its expansion strategy.
With fresh institutional backing, a growing portfolio of proprietary technologies and an expanding presence across multiple international markets, Maalexi is positioning itself to reshape the way agricultural commodities are verified, traded and settled globally.
As digital infrastructure increasingly becomes central to global trade, the company is betting that regulated blockchain-enabled exchanges will play a pivotal role in improving transparency, reducing risk and modernising one of the world’s most essential industries.
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