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Arab entrepreneurship is vital for job creation in the Arab world, a goal Arab entrepreneur Toukan has persistently pushed for in his work.

Samih Toukan, Founder, Maktoob.com

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ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

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ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

22.12.2011

ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

22.12.2011

ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

22.12.2011

ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

22.12.2011

ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

What does Maktoob.com stands for?

Maktoob has several meanings. It means letter or written or destiny . The idea was to build the first Arabic email and spread the usage of Arabic language on the net. This core then became the largest Arab Online Community with over 16.5 Million users and with full fledged services ranging from news to sports to blogs to entertainment etc
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History:
Maktoob was founded in 1998 by Samih Toukan and Hussam Khoury who were able to introduce a free email service with Arabic support for emails when no other free email service had such support. They also helped users who did not have Arabic Keyboards or browsers that support Arabic to send and receive emails by using a virtual keyboard which was done in Java, and using Java applets that had better Arabic support. The initial flourish of Maktoob and its large user base led the company to create several services and content channels for Arab users, many of which were not found previously in Arabic format.
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In June 2005, the UAE-based private equity house Abraaj Capital purchased 40% of the company shares in a USD 5.2 million buyout deal.

The rationale for such an acquisition

(according to Abraaj's website) is that Maktoob has a large user base (claimed to be more than 4 million) and, according to marketing literature, "a dominant online payment option cashU and a strong brand name.  It has established the first Arab online auction site souq.com which will benefit from leveraging the large community network. Abraaj Capital is among the world's 50-biggest private equity groups, and invests in the growing Middle East, North Africa and South Asia region, a region also known as MENASA.  Abraaj manages about $6.6 billion of funds and stakes in about two dozen companies, including some of the best known in the MENASA region. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraaj_Capital
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MAKTOOB KEY FACTS

Headquarters: Key Services: Amman, Jordan Maktoob.com the leading Arab portal with over 15 million unique Visitors, cashU; the electronic payment card, Souq.com; auctions and marketplace, Araby.com; the first Arabic search engine, Maktoob Research

Yahoo transaction: Aug 25th 2009 official

announcement: Maktoob.com, including Maktoob Research, will be a wholly-owned subsidiary of Yahoo! once the acquisition is completed later this year. (Unofficial estimates of size of deal: $75-$100 million.)

Offices:

Amman, Dubai, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Kuwait 288

Employees

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ESLSCA 37 B presented by Rana Darrag & Aliaa Nabil

Groups other entities Souq.com, CashU.com, Araby.com and Tahady.com will be part of a new company called Jabbar Internet Group that will have a focus on e-commerce and be managed by Maktoob founder Samih Toukan 11

Maktoob Now The Fifth Most Popular Homepage on Yahoo, Yahoo Captures 40% of Arab Display Ad Market When we look around the world, the Middle East and North Africa is one of the most exciting markets for us at Yahoo!, said Yahoos CEO Carl Bartz. Arabic is also one of the fastest growing languages on the Internet, yet only 1% of online content is in Arabic today, Bartz added. Part of Yahoo!s investment in MENA is to facilitate the growth of the Arabic language online. Because our teams are local, we understand what people need and in turn develop our products accordingly to serve up the right content. This is a big differentiator for us. We are not just a technology company, we create deeply personal digital experiences, Six months after the launch of the homepage, Yahoo! Maktoob has become the second biggest news destination in the region after Al Jazeera, and has established leadership in a number of content areas. For example, the company is number one in the regions online Entertainment with omg Arabic.
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Maktoob.com Inc. Alexa Traffic Rank estimate of maktoob.com popularity 190 Global Rank
The rank is calculated using a combination of average daily visitors to maktoob.com and page views on maktoob.com over the past 3 months. The site with the highest combination of visitors and page views is ranked #1.

An estimate of maktoob.com's popularity in a specific country.

Rank in SA Traffic Rank in Country

The rank by country is calculated using a combination of average daily visitors to maktoob.com and page views on maktoob.com from users from that country over the past 3 months. The site with the highest combination of visitors and page views is ranked #1 in that country. Reputation: 14,234 Sites Linking In A measure of maktoob.com's reputation. The number of links to maktoob.com from sites visited by users in the Alexa traffic panel. Links that were not seen by users in the Alexa traffic panel are not counted. Multiple links from the same site are only counted once.
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Visitors by Country for Maktoob.com Country Saudi Arabia Egypt Iran Algeria Sudan Libya United Arab Emirates Kuwait Qatar Iraq Percent of Visitors 24.4% 18.4% 8.4% 7.2% 5.5% 4.7% 4.4% 3.9% 3.4% 3.3%

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New Products:
Under the theme Ramadan Around the World, Ramadan Where You Are, Yahoo!s Middle East editorial team will personally select lifestyle and religious content from its News, Women, Video , and popular forums.

Growth in Online Advertising:

Already, Yahoo! Maktoob is the number one in the Middle East and North Africa for display advertising, with 40% market share. Online ad spend for the region is currently only 2% of total advertising spend for the entire region We envision the online ad market in MENA to reach at least 5-7% of the total ad market by 2015, said Bartz. And with our strong agency and client relationships along with our leadership in Science, Art, and Scale I am confident well be there to deliver the benefits.

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References
http://dinarstandard.com/technology/meet-the-chief-yahoo-ofthe-arab-world-2/ http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maktoob http://www.maktoob-research.com/ http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/maktoob.com# http://arabcrunch.com/2011/06/maktoob-now-the-fifth-mostpopular-homepage-on-yahoo-yahoo-captures-40-of-arabdisplay-ad-market.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraaj_Capital www.futureexploration.com. www.Wamda.com. celebration of entrepreneurship 2010

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