Aymen Mbarek

Aymen Mbarek is a Tunisian venture investor with roughly a decade of experience financing early- and mid-stage IT startups. He began on the fund side at two Tunisian/Franco-Tunisian venture capital firms — Sages Capital and Alternative Capital Partners (a subsidiary of the ACG group) — where he was assigned to seed and incubation vehicles including the INTECH' and Phenicia Seed Fund. He holds a 2012 professional certification in Private Equity from the Tunisian private equity and venture capital association (ATIC), and describes himself as an "IT startup expert, early-stage investment specialist, business advisor & scenarist."

His most prominent role was at IntilaQ, the Tunis-based incubator and fund launched in March 2014 in partnership with the Qatar Friendship Fund, Ooredoo Tunisia and Microsoft Tunisia. As Investment & Support Manager and later Director of Investments, Mbarek helped design IntilaQ's startup support programs and worked with the fund's CEO on reshaping its investment strategy. Under that strategy IntilaQ deployed about 12 million Tunisian dinars (just under €4 million) across roughly 26 startups in education, health, agriculture, e-commerce and B2B software, through its "IntilaQ For Growth" and "IntilaQ For Excellence" vehicles.

He is also an active writer and commentator on the Tunisian startup ecosystem, publishing essays on Medium since 2017 — including an open letter to Tunisian VCs ("Lettre ouverte aux VCs tunisiens"), pieces on B2B niche strategy, SaaS vs. perpetual licensing, and a "Startup Debugger" support methodology. His writing reflects a strong conviction that Tunisia's startups distinguish themselves in specialized B2B niches rather than consumer plays.

Mbarek now leads Go Big Partners, an early-stage VC firm he co-founded (with Seif Elileh Boukadida) and runs as CEO, based in Ariana. The firm pairs seasoned VC operators with senior software-business and marketing experts, taking a largely sector-agnostic approach but emphasizing B2B software and AI-based solutions. Go Big Partners is a beneficiary of the ANAVA fund-of-funds managed by Smart Capital.

• Stage: Seed and early-stage primarily; experienced in mid-stage follow-on (re-investing in best performers, as IntilaQ did with Roamsmart, Datavora, Symmetryk and Ezzayra in H1 2018).
• Sectors: B2B software/SaaS and AI-based solutions are the core focus at Go Big Partners; broader portfolio history spans big data, fintech, agtech, gaming/VR/AR, edtech and healthtech.
• What makes him say yes: Defensible, export-ready B2B "business niches." In his words, *"It's in B2B business niches that Tunisian startups stand out"* ("C'est sur les niches métier B2B que les startups tunisiennes se distinguent").
• Market view: Optimistic on access to capital — *"Startups [in Tunisia] genuinely have fairly easy access to financing, with terms inspired by international standards."*
• Geographic ambition: Backs Tunisian companies built to scale internationally — into Europe (Roamsmart, Datavora, Expensya, Symmetryk) and across Africa's OHADA region (Juridoc).
• Hands-on support: Advocates structured founder support over one-off "ideation challenges," articulated in his "Startup Debugger" approach.