10 South African Startups Join GrindstoneX, Naspers Labs Female-led Accelerator

The three-year GrindstoneX accelerator program, which seeks to empower female entrepreneurs while generating jobs, has chosen ten South African firms.

Disrupt Africa announced in October that Grindstone Accelerator, based in South Africa, has teamed up with Naspers Labs to introduce GrindstoneX, a new all-female accelerator programme aimed at enhancing the investability, scalability, and exit-readiness of women-led firms.

Grindstone, a company founded in 2014 and jointly owned by Knife Capital and Thinkroom, focused on helping high-growth, innovation-driven firms achieve scale. The youth development initiative of the international consumer internet company and technology investor, Naspers, is called Naspers Labs.

The two organizations have teamed up to create GrindstoneX, which will annually identify the top 10 female-founded South African businesses and put them through Grindstone’s 12-month growth engineering program. This program evaluates each business based on its individual merits and then provides targeted interventions that allow the business to undergo business transformation and growth.

The first cohort has now been chosen, and it consists of Blushproof, a company that designs cutting-edge, leak-free, and reusable period panties and sells them online; Africa Beyond 4IR, a digital incubation and empowerment program that introduces underserved communities to business opportunities in tech fields like animation, gaming, virtual reality, and drones; and

The grilled chicken eatery Chicken Bar offers online delivery using GPS and other cutting-edge technologies, while Four Minute Medicine offers e-learning and e-health summaries, videos, and courses to aid medical students and younger doctors in better learning and knowledge assimilation.

Thetha Digital, which develops top-notch digital and educational content for South African businesses, Tsehla Holdings, which builds futures for women in hydroponics using cutting-edge technology, Wisi-Oi, an online marketplace for pre-loved clothing, and Young Rebels Marketing, a digital marketing firm, were also chosen. Seponono Africa, a digital branding firm, Abaguquli4IR, which upskills and trains people with 4IR skills

GrindstoneX, which draws on the expertise and accomplishments of Grindstone’s growth engineering programs, is made possible by financial backing from Naspers Labs.

Female founders will go through thorough evaluations and analyses of their businesses, then, as necessary, carefully planned interventions.

Among the interventions are business strategy, planning for the go-to-market, getting ready for funding, networking, and expert business coaching, which includes guidance from Grindstone alumni companies that have successfully scaled or left their businesses.

“We have made a conscious effort to boost the proportion of firms that are created and run by women in all of our Grindstone programs. According to Catherine Young, partner at Grindstone, “this enables us to provide direct support to improve entrepreneurial prospects equally and to provide new springboards for investment-ready female-founded enterprises in South Africa.