Palm.hr Raises $5M Pre-Series A to Transform HR Tech and Employee Experiences Across MENA

Palm. Hr has raised $5 million in pre-Series A funding, focusing on employee comfort and providing modern HR teams with adequate management, growth, and people engagement tools.

Palm. Hr will use the investment to expand its reach across Saudi Arabia and enter new markets such as Egypt and the UAE. The company also intends to expand its offerings with new features and products, such as the ability for employees to purchase or rent assets and sign up for health or travel insurance, among other perks.

Palm. hr, co-founded in 2019 by Richard Schrems, Christoph Czichna, and Dragan Nikolic, aims to provide a streamlined and intuitive work experience for teams of all sizes in the Mena region. Everything from onboarding to time and vacation tracking, payroll, and offboarding is handled by the platform, which fully complies with local standards and regulations.

It is intended to be highly configurable to comply with local labor laws and employment regulations in various regional markets. Employee engagement, insurance, documentation, and other features are also included in the startup. Palm. hr has also built a multi-currency feature to support international payment requirements for regional businesses with global operations.

Richard Schrems, Co-Founder & CEO of palm.hr, stated about the company:

“The MENA region is transforming at an incredible pace, and businesses recognize the need to be empowered by technology and create meaningful workplace experiences. That is why we built Palm.hr, to equip HR professionals with the tools they need to succeed. With the backing of our investors, we are excited to kick off our next stage of growth and play a role in contributing to the future of the region’s economy.”

The company, which provides an entirely cloud-based service with mobile-first functionality, addresses the needs of both large and small businesses, enabling the automation of HR processes and driving employee engagement with coworkers to unlock their full potential.

Philip Specht, Partner at Speedinvest, commented on the funding:

“As EU-based investors, we have seen how companies such as Personio and Factorial are creating billion-dollar outcomes in the HR space. With a similar but localized approach, we believe that Palm HR is poised to become the leading player in the MENA region and the wider Arab world. The company has an outstanding team, a superior value proposition in terms of features, integrations and UX, and strong customer love. We are thrilled to back Palm HR, reflecting our excitement about the wider startup ecosystem in MENA.”

Palm. hr also integrates with government services such as Mudad for digital payroll and compliance mandated by the Saudi Ministry of Labor; The General Organization for Social Insurance (GOSI); and Muqeem, the foreign employees’ data platform, in addition to providing advisory services to clients as needed.

Tala Alasmari, Raed Ventures’ founding partner, added:

“As the world’s fastest-growing major economy, Saudi Arabia’s businesses recognize the benefits of embedding innovative technology within their operations to unlock performance, speed and scale. We are proud to back Palm.hr, a Saudi-first success story creating impact across borders and playing a transformative role in the future of work.”

Palm. hr raised an undisclosed amount in a bridge funding round led by Nama Ventures, with participation from other prominent Saudi angel investors in 2021.