Qatar's Fingerprint on Global Payments: Rasmal Ventures Backs Yuno's $45M Series B

There's a quiet pattern behind the biggest fintech raises coming out of the Gulf right now: global platforms aren't just taking Gulf money, they're taking Gulf partners. The latest example is Yuno, the AI-native operating system for global payments, which just closed a $45 million Series B — and right in the middle of the cap table sits Rasmal Ventures, Qatar's first institutionally-backed investment firm.

The Round

The Series B was led by Global PayTech Ventures, with a heavyweight investor list behind it — Andreessen Horowitz, Tiger Global, QuantumLight Capital, Monashees, Kaszek, and Endeavor Catalyst all took part. Rasmal Ventures, trusted by sovereign backers including the Qatar Investment Authority, joined as a strategic regional investor. It wasn't alone from the Gulf: Further Ventures, the Abu Dhabi sovereign-backed firm, also came in.

Why GrowthX Capital's Presence Matters

One name in the round deserves a closer look: GrowthX Capital, the Qatar-based family office founded by Hamad Al Hajri — and notably, one of Rasmal Ventures' own investors. GrowthX riding alongside Rasmal into the same deal isn't a coincidence so much as a signal of how tightly Qatar's investment ecosystem is starting to move together, with capital and conviction flowing from the same circles into the same opportunities.

Al Hajri's own read on the deal traces back years, to Yuno co-founder and CEO Juan Pablo Ortega's time building Rappi, Colombia's first unicorn. Al Hajri believes Ortega is now building his next one — this time out of the GCC, with Qatar positioned as the regional hub. That's a strong statement from a local investor with a front-row seat, and it says as much about confidence in Qatar's fintech infrastructure as it does about Yuno itself.

Rasmal's Playbook

For Rasmal, the investment fits a model the firm has been building for a while: prove out Gulf market access for a company before writing the check, rather than investing first and hoping distribution follows. By the time Rasmal committed, Yuno had already done the groundwork — a regional office in Qatar, a Payment Technical Service Provider certification from the Saudi Central Bank for Yuno Payments Arabia in April 2026, and a partnership with Tap Payments that opened local rails including Mada, KNET, and NAPS across all six GCC countries. A buy-now-pay-later tie-up with Tabby also connected the platform to more than 25 million shoppers across Saudi Arabia and the UAE.

Soumaya Ben Beya Dridje, Partner at Rasmal Ventures, framed the thesis around timing: the Gulf is now one of the fastest-growing payments markets globally, tracking the same new trade corridors, wallets, and shoppers Yuno already serves. She pointed to Ortega and his team's combination of global ambition and financial discipline as the reason Rasmal backed the round.

Yuno, By the Numbers

Yuno connects merchants to more than 1,000 payment methods and 460-plus integrations across 190 countries through a single API, with intelligent routing, one-click checkout, and built-in AI fraud detection. Over the past year, the platform recovered more than $5 billion in transaction volume that would otherwise have failed, lifted authorization rates by roughly 5 percent, and saved merchants over $500 million in processing costs. Its client roster includes McDonald's, NetEase Games, GoFundMe, inDrive, and Rappi.

Ortega said the round is meant to meet existing customer growth rather than chase new growth, with the company targeting a clear path to profitability within the year. He also noted that being genuinely local everywhere is the hardest problem in payments — and that anyone starting on it now is already years behind.

The Bigger Picture

The Yuno deal extends Rasmal's broader strategy of building two-way access between Gulf capital and international innovation across MENA, Türkiye, and Asia. It's also a reminder that Qatar's investment ecosystem — Rasmal, GrowthX, and the sovereign capital behind them — is increasingly showing up together on the same cap tables, not just as passive checks but as the on-ramp global companies need to actually operate in the region.

About Rasmal Ventures

Rasmal Ventures is Qatar's first institutionally-backed investment firm, trusted by sovereign wealth funds including the Qatar Investment Authority. The firm invests across MENA, Türkiye, and Asia, validating Gulf market access before committing capital. Rasmal's partners have previously delivered a 5x fund return, backing companies including Careem and Snoonu.

About Yuno

Yuno is the AI-native operating system of global payments and financial services, powering the financial infrastructure of enterprise merchants, banks, and wallets. Through one API, Yuno connects them to payins, payouts, fraud prevention, KYC/KYB, and stablecoins at global scale. Learn more at www.y.uno.