9 Startups Join Katapult Africa Accelerator Programme
The Katapult Africa Accelerator Programme, which gives entrepreneurs access to US$150,000 in investment and other support, has chosen nine startups from across the continent.
A number of African entrepreneurs have received funding from the Norwegian-based Katapult Accelerator, which has also spun out projects including Katapult Ocean and a program devoted to addressing climate change. The Katapult Africa Accelerator Programme, which aims to accelerate and invest in agri-tech and climate-tech firms, was announced by Disrupt Africa in March after it had collaborated with the Tony Blair Institute (TBI) for Global Change, Norrsken, and Smart Africa.
Nine African impact technology entrepreneurs working on a variety of game-changing agri-, food-, and climate-tech solutions were chosen to join the program, which was officially inaugurated last week in Kigali, Rwanda.
The startups will participate in growth, impact, and investor ready sessions as part of the Katapult Africa Accelerator Program. The goal of the three-month program is to prepare the cohort of businesses for growth in African markets through rigorous workshops, online meetups, mentor sessions, pitch training, and investor presentations.
Two firms, GrowAgric, an aquaculture innovation company, and Aquarech, an agritech startup, represent Kenya and Ghana, respectively. Legendary Foods is a food producer, and Spark is a social finance app.
The cohort is completed by the Madagascan supply chain solution Elucid, the Senegalese B2B marketplace Afrikamart, and the Moroccan agri-tech business Sand to Green. Nigeria also has two representatives in the form of the cold storage solution Gricd and the agri-tech startup Vetsark.
700 candidates were considered before the startups were selected.
“At Katapult, we have big goals, and our ambition is to create a prosperous world for everyone. Because of this, today’s launch is a significant step forward for Katapult and the impact community, according to Tharald Nustad, the company’s creator.
“We decided to establish Katapult in Africa because there is an extraordinary opportunity for creativity as well as an obvious demand for change. It is all too obvious that we need to speed up technological advancements to address the climate issue and assure food security. We also think that Africa, with its young, tech-savvy population and rapidly expanding business communities, is best suited to create highly scalable, highly effective solutions.
