Announcing Our New Brand

Celebrating Two Decades of Lasting Impact, Looking to the Future 

We are thrilled to launch Alfanar Venture Philanthropy’s new brand and visual identity. As we celebrate twenty years of empowering social enterprises to drive lasting education, employment and economic impact for women, youth and children in the Arab region, our new look both honours our roots and charts a path forward into the next chapter of our work and impact.  

Alfanar, meaning “beacon” in Arabic, was founded in 2004 by the late Tarek Ben Halim, who after a career in investment banking, decided to realise his dream of helping to build a strong, vibrant and effective civil society across the Arab region. He started Alfanar based on a conviction that investing in bright leaders and good ideas was the key to addressing the region’s most enduring challenges. Tarek endeavored to create a trustworthy, transparent and credible platform that would pool the capital of likeminded philanthropists and funders to achieve this dream.   

From our first social investments in Egypt in 2005 – supporting an environmental science center for children and an association helping child quarry workers, we have supported over 185 social enterprises across Egypt, Lebanon, Jordan and Palestine through funding, capability building and real-time impact tracking tools. 

We have helped social enterprises scale regionally and globally, while ensuring they are financially resilient into the future. As we look to the future, we recognise that there is much more work to be done. Our support not only brings hope, but now brings two decades of experience fostering sustainable, scalable growth.  

Our new brand is the expression of this journey. Alfanar’s original swirl reflected our early years of experimentation and testing. Our long-term hope for the Arab world has always been clear, as evidenced by the blue core. The multiple vectors of the swirl reflected the energy, passion and resilience of our first two decades as we gradually put in place the pieces of our current venture philanthropy approach. 

We have now taken our old swirl logo and updated it with modern Arabic calligraphy. The “ف”, or central letter in the middle, continues to represent a beacon of hope, but now with light at the centre firmly paving the way for our enduring, structural approach to social change. The addition of Venture Philanthropy to Alfanar and the stability of the geometric calligraphy reflect the strength of our guiding values – impact, investment, independence, imagination and integrity. 

"We are deeply grateful to our community of donors and supporters who have made our work possible, and to our social enterprises – whose commitment to driving transformative change, despite endless challenges, continues to motivate and inspire us," said Myrna Atalla, Alfanar Executive Director. "Our new brand is a milestone as we work together towards our vision of an Arab region where youth, women and children have access to the education and opportunity they and their families need to lead dignified lives."