Saudi Billionaire Lubna Olayan's Firm Betting Big on Female-led Startups

• Dara Holdings, Lubna Olayan’s investment firm is augmenting bets on female-led businesses
• The firm has made a series of investment for bridging the gender financing gap
• It has also invested in a Dubai-based artificial intelligence startup qeen.ai

One of the richest women of Saudi Arabia, billionaire Lubna Olayan’s investment firm, Dara Holdings is betting on the businesses that are led by women, intending to help bridging the gender financing gap, specifically in male-dominated region.

A series of investment has been made by the firm which is Lubna’s family office since the United Arab Emirates-based startups were founded by females in the mid-2024. The firm took part in a seed funding round of $10 million which was disclosed in February 2025 for a Dubai-based artificial intelligence startup qeen.ai, co-founded by former Google executive Dina Alsamhan. This particular initiative followed the initial pre-seed investment of the organisation in a round that took place in June last year, raising $2.2 million.

The former head of Google Saudi Arabia Alsamhan said in a linkedin post mentioning his happiness regarding the latest fundraising of qeen.ai, “Grateful and proud.” This fundraising is MENA’s (Middle East and North Africa) of the biggest-ever seed rounds.

The organisation participated in a $5.5 million capital raise for an Abu Dhabi-based drug delivery platform BioSapien in the month of December. The platform was founded by physician Khatija Ali. Tim Draper, the Silicon Valley investor also featured the platform on Meet the Drapers, the startup competition web series.

Additionally, Walid Haram, the Chief Investment Officer at Dara said in a statement, “If an investment ticks the boxes, and it supports women in the region, that for us is a big additional plus. It’s a big focus. We are very keen on creating an investment climate that focuses on R&D and entrepreneurship. We want to create these opportunities in the region.”