Hollydesk Debuts BNPL Option for Egyptian SMBs

Cairo-based FinTech Hollydesk announced on Thursday (June 30) a buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) option that lets its small business customers pay vendors over a 30-to-90 day period.

Hollydesk’s main product is its system, which processes invoices and employee expenses. The company also analyzes expenses on behalf of customers. Its website advertises the offering as “a single platform where you can reimburse, pay employees and manage invoices in seconds.” The BNPL system is integrated with the payments platform for some small- to medium-sized business customers.

Hollydesk also offers some businesses financing to help them manage cashflow.

“It is time to proudly say that we have launched a buy now, pay later and B2B supplier invoices in Egypt to support businesses through our platform,” Mahmoud Moussa, founder and chief of Hollydesk, said in a prepared statement.

“Banks usually offer financing options such as loans to companies and institutions, but a large segment of companies cannot benefit from these solutions due to the lack of mechanisms that allow them to obtain financing solutions from banks in the traditional way,” he said. “This is the challenge that Hollydesk has transformed into an investment opportunity.”

Hollydesk also announced that it is using artificial intelligence rather than traditional credit reports to assess potential BNPL borrowers.

“Our main goal is to build business-friendly financial solutions to offer them business credit to help fund their businesses, pay suppliers, and grow by offering them short-term loans,” Moussa said.

For the first six months of calendar 2022, the company stated, Hollydesk conducted transactions valued at $2.7 million. The company also said it anticipates transaction for 2023 to be around $27 million.

Hollydesk is not alone in offering BNPL options to businesses.

Read more: The Next Trillion-Dollar BNPL Opportunity

As PYMNTS reported earlier this week,  many believe that BNPL’s untapped opportunity lies in B2B sales, and 2022 is seeing more deals of this kind as a tight credit market makes existing trade-finance solutions a lot less attractive.