Kenyan Startup, Leta Secures $3M to Expand to West Africa in 2023
Leta, a Kenyan startup, has raised $3 million in order to expand across West Africa in 2023.
Leta is a B2B supply chain and logistics SaaS company that was established in 2021 to improve fleet management. Leta is searching for growth prospects in West Africa while also increasing its business in its current five markets, which are Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.
In its expansion phase early the next year, the business plans to work with some of the top wholesalers and e-commerce players in Ghana and ultimately Nigeria.
Participants in the round included Charles Murito, a Google executive, Ken Njoroge, the co-founder of Cellulant, Chandaria Capital, Chui Ventures, PANI, Samurai Incubate, and Verdant Frontiers Fintech.
“Our upcoming year will be fairly significant for us. We have a solid grasp of both our sales process and go-to-market strategy, and our product has stabilized. According to Leta founder and CEO Nick Joshi, “the money we have raised will assist us to quickly scale into additional regions starting with Ghana, where we will launch in December.” Leta is also developing finance products and a transit marketplace, he added to TechCrunch.
“We are an operating system for logistics, and our software is able to show distributors the most efficient route to serve the customers quicker, and enables them to use less assets (vehicles) to serve more customers”
Nick Joshi, CEO Leta
The CEO of Leta said, “It also enables the tracking of the driver, the particular commodities carried, the loading of the truck to determine whether space use is optimal, the time spent during the voyage, and distance traveled.
Leta’s strategy for growth
Since its founding, Leta claims to have handled 2,000 cars, transported more than 20,000 tons of products, and optimized over 500,000 deliveries.
The firm has collaborated with more than 20 significant companies, such as B2B e-commerce distribution platform Twiga, fashion marketplace ShopZetu, pan-African fast-food juggernaut Simbisa Brands, and fast-moving consumer goods conglomerate Chandaria Industries, whose family office invested in its most recent round.
“As a major FMCG company in the area, we are constantly working to improve our operations so that we can meet the expanding demand. We are experiencing significant savings on our logistics expenditures as well as a quicker service delivery time because to Leta’s crucial assistance in streamlining our last mile distribution, according to Chandaria Capital CEO Darshan Chandaria.
After closely collaborating with the Leta team, Chandaria Capital decided to invest because it was “impressed with the team, the technology they are developing, and the size of the problem they are solving.”
The CEO of the business claims that Leta has a first-mover advantage in the area and plans to keep developing and improving its technology, intellectual property, and products to address market issues.
When their fleets are insufficient, Leta’s customers will be able to request extra delivery cars thanks to the company’s plans to develop a transport marketplace.
They will be able to request more vehicles using our platform, and we will be able to swiftly link them to new providers.
“Our technology keeps track of factors like usage, allowing us to pair distributors with the finest suppliers. This is intriguing because instead of renting a truck to a consumer for a single service like other marketplaces now do. Due of our capacity to utilize loads, a truck might carry many loads.
The business is also in discussions with lenders to offer asset financing to clients who want to increase the size of their fleets.
“We want to do it in a really organized way, and our technology is a terrific basis for us to develop other things on top of,” the company says.
