OVI is the AI-native ATS where you chat to hire. Two AI agents — Sora for sourcing and Milo for screening — find candidates, score every CV, and run AI interviews, all controlled from a single chat.

What does "chat to hire" mean?

Chat to hire is OVI's AI-native hiring workflow: instead of clicking through a traditional ATS, you describe what you need in chat and OVI's AI agents source candidates, screen applicants, run AI interviews, and send outreach for you.

What is an AI-native ATS?

An AI-native ATS is an applicant tracking system built around AI agents rather than forms and pipelines. OVI's AI chat ATS lets recruiters source, screen, interview, and follow up through conversation — the agents do the work and surface only the candidates worth meeting.

Who are Sora and Milo?

Sora is OVI's AI sourcing agent — she scans LinkedIn, the open web, and your ATS history to find best-fit candidates and reach out in your name. Milo is OVI's AI screening agent — he scores every applicant against your rubric and surfaces a ranked shortlist.

How do OVI's AI interviews work?

OVI runs async AI interviews for every shortlisted candidate and returns scores, transcripts, and recordings — so your team only meets the people worth meeting.

UAE AI Recruiter Qureos Secures $5M to Scale Iris — the Platform Cutting Gulf Hiring to 6 Days with Built-In Nationalization Compliance

2026-06-19

By AI HR Daily

UAE-based AI hiring platform Qureos closed a $5 million seed round in February 2026, led by Prosus Ventures and co-led by Salica Oryx Fund (Wamda; Prosus). The capital injection comes at a pivotal moment for MENA talent acquisition: McKinsey projects a 127 million workforce expansion in the region over the next decade, while PwC survey data shows 30 percent of Middle East respondents are actively seeking new career opportunities (Khaleej Times, sponsored content). For HR leaders managing Gulf operations, the convergence of rapid hiring demand and mandatory nationalization quotas — Saudi Arabia's Saudization and the UAE's Emiratization programs — makes compliant, fast recruitment technology a strategic priority, not a nice-to-have.

What Iris Does

Iris, Qureos's AI-powered hiring assistant, unifies sourcing, screening, and interviewing into a single workflow. The platform distributes job postings across more than 2,000 global job boards and screens candidate profiles in under 15 seconds, according to the company (Wamda; FFNews). Iris also conducts AI-led audio and video interviews and generates matching summaries for recruiters.

The company reports that Iris compresses hiring timelines from months to approximately six days and surfaces an average of 47 relevant candidates per search in 26 seconds (Wamda; Khaleej Times, sponsored content). The platform integrates with existing ATS and HRIS systems or can operate as a standalone solution (Prosus).

Qureos currently serves more than 1,000 enterprise and public sector organizations — including Qatar Airways, Dubai Economy and Tourism, BAAN Holdings, Union Properties, RemotePass, DP World, and Unilever — and claims a candidate pool of over 7 million across the MENA region (Wamda; Khaleej Times, sponsored content).

Nationalization Compliance Built In

What sets Iris apart in the Gulf market is its attention to nationalization compliance. Saudization and Emiratization programs require employers to meet quotas for hiring local citizens — a complex operational challenge when managing high-volume recruitment across multiple jurisdictions. According to Prosus, the platform has been "built with regional requirements in mind, including localization and nationalization policies across GCC markets," though the company has not publicly detailed the specific technical implementation (Prosus; Wamda).

For large employers, the compliance burden translates to significant manual effort. According to the company, Iris eliminates approximately 2,160 hours of annual recruiter workload per organization by automating the 15 hours of manual application review and initial interviews typically required per role (Wamda; FFNews). Khaleej Times (sponsored content) reports potential reductions in time-to-hire and recruitment costs of up to 43 percent — a company-reported figure that should be read as directionally informative rather than independently verified (Khaleej Times).

Funding and Investors

The $5 million seed round was led by Prosus Ventures and co-led by Salica Oryx Fund, with participation from Oraseya Capital, Plus VC, F6 Ventures, BDev Ventures, Sunny Side Venture Partners, and angel investor Daniel Tyre, an early HubSpot executive. Existing backers COTU Ventures and Globivest also participated (Wamda; FFNews).

The round follows a $3 million pre-seed in 2022 led by COTU Ventures and Colle Capital (Wamda). Qureos was founded in 2020 by Alexander Epure (CEO) and Usama Nini.

"Qureos has built a practical, end-to-end system that replaces fragmented recruitment workflows with a single, intelligent platform," said Robin Voogd, Head of Middle East Investments at Prosus Ventures (Prosus).

Proceeds will fund AI capability development, expanded go-to-market reach, and global enterprise and agency partnerships (Prosus).

Market Context

The MENA hiring market is entering a period of structural expansion. McKinsey's projection of 127 million new workers over the next decade, combined with PwC data showing nearly a third of Middle East professionals are open to switching roles, suggests that recruitment infrastructure — not just headcount budgets — will be the bottleneck for employers scaling in the region (Khaleej Times, sponsored content).

Gulf governments continue to enforce nationalization requirements. For enterprises operating across Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and neighboring markets, recruitment tools that account for local hiring mandates have a clear operational advantage.

Looking Ahead

Iris enters a MENA AI hiring landscape that is attracting increasing attention from global investors and enterprise buyers. Whether Qureos can convert its early client base and compliance advantage into durable market position will depend on execution — specifically, how effectively it scales beyond the Gulf while maintaining the localization that earned it traction there. For HR leaders evaluating AI recruitment platforms for MENA operations, Iris is a name worth tracking.

Sources:

Wamda — "AI hiring platform Qureos secures $5 million to scale in MENA" (February 2026)
Prosus — "Prosus Ventures invests US$5 million in Qureos to accelerate AI-driven hiring" (February 2026)
FFNews — "Prosus Ventures & Qureos AI Recruitment MENA" (February 2026)
Khaleej Times (KT Network, sponsored content) — "Qureos launches Iris AI recruitment game-changer in the MENA region" (July 2023)

What is Qureos Iris and what does it do?

Iris is an AI-powered hiring assistant by UAE-based Qureos that unifies sourcing, screening, and interviewing. It posts jobs to 2,000+ boards, screens CVs in under 15 seconds, conducts AI-led audio and video interviews, and compresses hiring timelines from months to approximately six days.

How does Qureos Iris handle nationalization compliance in the Gulf?

According to Prosus, Iris is built with regional requirements in mind, including localization and nationalization policies across GCC markets such as Saudi Arabia's Saudization and the UAE's Emiratization programs. The platform is designed to help enterprises account for local hiring mandates, though the company has not publicly detailed the specific technical implementation.

Who invested in Qureos and how much was raised?

Qureos raised a $5 million seed round in February 2026, led by Prosus Ventures and co-led by Salica Oryx Fund. Additional participants included Oraseya Capital, Plus VC, F6 Ventures, BDev Ventures, Sunny Side Venture Partners, angel investor Daniel Tyre (early HubSpot), plus existing backers COTU Ventures and Globivest.