Dubai, Aug. 13, 2026 – UAE-headquartered mobility financing and fleet technology platform Naran raised $10 million in debt and equity financing from UAE-based investment firm Landel.
The capital will fund the expansion of Naran’s vehicle fleets across existing markets in Colombia, Peru, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire, support an upcoming entry into Paraguay, and accelerate expansion into the Middle East and North Africa region.
Naran also plans to commercialize its proprietary fleet management system as a software-as-a-service product for third-party operators and provide asset-backed debt financing for external fleet expansion.
Founded in 2025 by former Yango executives Bayaskhalan Alexeev and Alexander Gubarev, Naran provides rent-to-own financing terms ranging from 12 to 60 months for cars and motorcycles. The platform procures vehicles directly from automotive manufacturers and partners with on-demand ride-hailing and delivery networks, including Yango and inDrive, to supply vehicles to underbanked gig workers.
“We address a critical financing gap in emerging markets, where ride-hailing and delivery drivers cannot access traditional bank loans due to irregular income or limited credit histories,” said Bayaskhalan Alexeev, chief executive officer and co-founder of Naran. “Every vehicle we finance is an active driver added to our partners’ marketplaces, solving the primary supply constraint faced by ride-hailing and delivery platforms.”
Alexeev noted that by integrating driver onboarding, repayment schedules, vehicle tracking and maintenance into a unified digital infrastructure, the company uses initial vehicle contracts to build formal credit histories for informal gig economy workers.
The market opportunity for asset-backed vehicle financing in emerging regions is substantial. In sub-Saharan Africa, informal employment accounts for nearly 88% of the total workforce, sharply restricting access to traditional underwriting and formal banking. According to data from management consultancy Oliver Wyman, the shared mobility sector across Africa is projected to reach approximately $8 billion by 2030, adding more than 550,000 income-earning opportunities. The research highlights that mobility constraints reduce national gross domestic product by 4% to 5% in key urban centers like Abidjan, even as gig-economy drivers earn up to 130% more than workers in comparable-skill roles.
Similar dynamics are driving asset-backed mobility fintechs across these regions. Sector peers such as Nigeria-born Moove, which operates an asset-backed vehicle financing model backed by Uber, and Autochek Africa, which provides digital automotive financing marketplaces across West, East, and North Africa, are addressing the same structural supply gaps in emerging markets.
“Naran combines asset-backed lending with hard collateral, daily cash flows, and operational telematics,” said Aidar Musin, managing partner at Landel. “Every deployed asset is secured by a revenue-generating vehicle, and the underlying software stack allows the business to scale efficiently into third-party fleet management.”
By 2030, Naran aims to operate across 10 emerging markets, deploying a fleet of 10,000 cars and 20,000 motorcycles to support 30,000 mobility entrepreneurs.
