Egypt’s Ministry of Investment and Foreign Trade is preparing to activate the TradeTech Sandbox, an experimental regulatory environment dedicated to innovative technological solutions in trade, with the aim of enabling entrepreneurs and startups to develop tools based on technology, artificial intelligence, and foreign trade data.
Dr. Mohamed Farid, Minister of Investment and Foreign Trade, announced this during his virtual participation in a ministerial session at the fourth edition of the Egyptian Entrepreneurship Sector Summit (2026 SDR Summit), organized by Intilaq. The summit focuses on the role of data and innovation in developing Egypt’s entrepreneurship ecosystem.
A Platform for Testing Foreign Trade Solutions
According to the minister’s presentation, the regulatory sandbox will help startups leverage available data to identify export opportunities, monitor international trade trends, and produce more detailed information about foreign markets. The source did not specify an exact date for launching the sandbox or the mechanisms for accepting participating companies and solutions.
The initiative is part of a broader vision that regards entrepreneurship as a tool for improving the efficiency and competitiveness of services, rather than an activity confined to a single sector. Farid said that innovation has contributed in recent years to developing areas including mass transportation, the delivery of products and services, the financial sector, as well as trade, industry, exports, and investment.
Proposed Amendments to the Legal Framework
The ministry is also working to introduce amendments to the executive regulations of Companies Law No. 159 of 1981. The proposed amendments include establishing a framework for dealing with shareholders’ agreements, regulating debt contracts convertible into shares (Convertible Notes), and creating a registry for these contracts.
The measures also include regulating the valuation of capital increases through specialized companies and making a registry available for them, in addition to working to preserve companies’ continuity and commercial history when ownership or structural changes occur, including in sole proprietorships. The minister pointed to coordination with the Ministry of Supply and Internal Trade regarding the commercial registry, and with the Financial Regulatory Authority regarding the central registry for capital increases.
What Will Change in Practice?
If these steps are implemented, startup founders and investors will have clearer rules for certain financing and ownership instruments, while the TradeTech Sandbox could provide an experimental pathway for solutions that need to handle data or procedures related to foreign trade. However, the source does not yet clarify the scope of the available data, the entity that will oversee the testing, or the controls imposed on the use of artificial intelligence within the sandbox.
Farid stressed that startup financing must accommodate risk and the possibility that some companies may fail, explaining that a company’s lack of success does not mean the failure of the entrepreneurship ecosystem. He referred to previous reforms that included establishing standards for evaluating startups, regulating crowdfunding, developing venture capital funds, and issuing licenses to companies operating in innovative financing fields, including crowdfunding in the real estate sector.
He also noted that some companies with high growth rates need to expand beyond the Egyptian market while continuing their activities inside the country, in order to reach a scale that supports their competitiveness regionally and internationally.