DeveloPPP Ventures, a startup program sponsored by the German government, has announced a grant of €100,000 for startups in Kenya and Tanzania to help them grow their impact-driven businesses. A project of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), develoPPP Ventures is carried out by DEG Impulse and sponsored by Seedstars, a…
In order to launch the commercial delivery of locally produced electric buses and charging infrastructure, the Kenyan firm BasiGo has acquired US$6.6 million in new seed funding. In November of last year, Disrupt Africa announced that BasiGo had begun operations in Nairobi after securing KES100 million (US$900,000) in finance earlier in the year. The firm…
A $225 million venture financing platform has been developed by the International Finance Corporation (IFC) to support early-stage businesses in Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, and Pakistan. In order to “develop them into scalable companies that can attract mainstream equity and debt finance,” the IFC, a member of the World Bank, will invest in…
The Plug & Play, iCubed Capital, WZ Capital, and the Jozi Angels Network participated in the pre-seed round of funding for the South African telehealth platform Contro. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also provided grant funding from the i3 fund. Contro was founded in June 2021 and presently provides six services, including once-off STI,…
Eden Care, a Rwandan insurtech firm that provides businesses and their employees with inexpensive, individualized, and accessible health coverage, has acquired pre-seed capital to support its growth across East Africa. The two biggest reinsurers in Africa, Zep Re and Africa Re, support Eden Care, a licensed provider of digital health insurance. The start-up gives companies…
A US$600,000 pre-seed fundraising round has been completed by Nigerian startup CutStruct Technology to help with the growth and scalability of its B2B construction procurement application LiveVend. CutStruct, a company founded by John Oamen and Tayo Odunsi, has created LiveVend, a platform for construction procurement that enables buyers like contractors and real estate developers to…
With the aid of Buffet Investments, KLT, and the Shoprite Group as the lead investors, Omnisient, a provider of consumer privacy-protecting data collaboration platforms in emerging markets, has raised a $3.5 million round of expansion financing. The expansion round was oversubscribed, and more investors joined original investors Investec and Nedbank, as well as follow-on investors…
Credit cards are hard to come by in Egypt. Only 4.8 million credit cards, or less than 5% of Egypt’s 104 million people, are available to be used to service that population, according to the Central Bank of Egypt. Due to wage reductions, an increase in unemployment and underemployment, and a general slowdown in the…
Quona Capital, a venture capital firm specializing in emerging countries, has announced the final closing of its Fund III at US$332 million, much above its US$250 million goal. As a stand-alone venture capital firm, Quona Capital was founded in 2015 by managing partners Jonathan Whittle, Ganesh Rengaswamy, and Monica Brand Engel. It concentrates its investments…
MOL PLUS, the corporate venture capital arm of Mitsui O.S.K. Lines, has announced funding for Kenyan fulfillment and logistics enabler Sendy as part of a new undisclosed round to support it as it expands fulfillment services in Kenya, Uganda, Nigeria, and Ivory Coast. Thousands of businesses use Sendy’s platforms and APIs to sell and transport…
A $600,000 Seed round headed by Innlife investments has been raised by the foodtech firm Brotinni in Egypt. Dalia Abou Omar founded Brotinni, a website where customers may order hand-cut, farm-sourced, fresh meat and poultry that has been vacuum-sealed. Additionally, it offers ready-to-cook and flash-frozen items. It uses its own fleet of drivers to provide…
A multi-sided marketplace called Yassir has announced that it has raised $150 million in Series B funding from well-known international investors. The marketplace offers on-demand services like banking, food and grocery delivery, ride-hailing, and more. DN Capital, Dorsal Capital, Quiet Capital, Stanford Alumni Ventures (formerly known as Spike Ventures), and Y Combinator were among the…
Hoods, a live e-commerce platform developed in Egypt, has received finance from valU, a division of the Egyptian investment bank EFG-Hermes. Mostafa Hanafi and Waleed Ghalwas created Hoods in late 2020 to help consumers identify and compare goods through live video. Through a seamless experience, its digital platform brings together a retailer, a content producer,…
Open finance start-up Spotter, based in Morocco, has received funding from UM6P Ventures in an undisclosed amount. The notification was published on the business networking site LinkedIn. The startup participated in Morocco’s first Plug & Play acceleration program. Spotter, a company founded by Abdele Boukachabine and Mamoune Kettani, creates an application programming interface (API)-driven platform…
AfyA Care’s Series A capital round will include a $6 million investment by CardinalStone Capital Advisers (CCA), a manager of a West African private equity fund. In Nigeria, a healthcare organization called AfyA Treatment offers integrated healthcare services such as hospital care, health insurance, and health technology services. The investment exemplifies CCA’s goal of supporting…
A $30 million fund has been closed by Satgana, a European venture capital (VC) company with its headquarters in Luxembourg, to support entrepreneurs that address climate change issues in Africa. The fund will accomplish this by investing up to €500K in entrepreneurs in Europe and Africa throughout their pre-seed and seed stages. Along with providing…
Some of the biggest obstacles facing startup founders in sub-Saharan Africa are access to finance and a lack of support structures. And although though the continent’s venture capital and founder support programs are expanding, much work still has to be done to satisfy the financial, technological, and social capital needs of underserved groups, particularly women…
Classera, an international edtech business that specializes on emerging markets, has secured $40 million in a Series A round, making it the most in EdTech history for a startup. The fundraising round is also the biggest one ever in edtech, MENA, and much of Africa. Sanabil Investments, a fully owned subsidiary of the Public Investment…
MoneyFellows is a smartphone platform that digitalizes money circles, also known as Rotating Savings and Credit Associations (ROSCAs), which are also popularly referred to as “Gameya” in Egypt and other Arab nations. Through the platform, users may efficiently plan and manage their financial responsibilities and reach their financial goals. MoneyFellows provides a safe and practical…
Real estate co-ownership startup Seqoon, located in Egypt, raised $500,000 in a pre-seed round through Banque Misr’s pilot program to promote cutting-edge entrepreneurs in Egypt. Several eminent angel investors also took part in the round. Omar Eldessouky and Mohamed Elkhatieb founded Seqoon in 2022, which enables consumers to co-own parts of a vacation property. The…
With a focus on the unbanked, the Egyptian fintech firm Kiwe has received funding from valU, an EFG Hermes Holding subsidiary that offers a buy now pay later (BNPL) service and has operations in both Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Kiwe is a social payment app. Kiwe, a peer-to-peer money exchange app, was created in March…
The Moko Home + Living furniture company in Kenya has just raised $6.5 million to expand. The Serie B debt funding round was led by Talanton, an American investment group, and the Swiss investor AlphaMundi Group. Along with Talanton and Novastar Ventures, other partners were Blink CV and Kenya’s Victoria Commercial Bank, which contributed $2…
A pan-African digital marketplace for business-to-business trade has been launched by Dooka in collaboration with Tradeshift, the worldwide network for digital trade. Dooka, which is offered on Tradeshift’s worldwide B2B commerce platform and which makes use of the Tradeshift® Marketplace Operator solution, makes corporate purchase as user-friendly and consumer-focused as home shopping. The Dooka marketplace…
In Kenya, SC Ventures, the innovation, fintech investment, and ventures arm of Standard Chartered, has begun operating Solv, a business-to-business (B2B) digital platform. This platform will combine several services to alter the profitability, growth, and operational efficiency for Micro, Small, and Medium-Sized Enterprises through an open and inclusive trade ecosystem along the MSME value chain…
Following a successful debut in August, Nigeria-based mobility fintech startup Moove—largest Uber’s car supply partner in EMEA—has raised GBP15 million (US$16.8 million) in funding from Emso Asset Management to expand up its UK operations. By providing revenue-based car finance to mobility entrepreneurs, the Nigerians Ladi Delano and Jide Odunsi of British birth founded Moove in…
B2B pharmaceutical platform i’SUPPLY, based in Egypt, has secured US$1.5 million in a pre-seed round to expand throughout the Middle East and Africa. Ibrahim Emam, Malek Sultan, and Moustafa Zaki founded i’SUPPLY in 2021 with the goal of digitising the pharmaceutical industry by offering a one-stop-shop solution to promptly anticipate and deal with supply chain…
Bumpa, a Nigerian e-commerce startup, has announced a $4 million raise in its recently concluded seed funding round. Plug & Play Ventures Commerce Fund, SHL Capital, Jedar Capital, Magic Fund, DFS Labs, FirstCheck Africa Angel Program, E62 Ventures, Club14, and Fast Forward Ventures also participated. Base10 Partners served as the round’s lead investor. Bumpa has…
MaxAB, a B2B e-commerce and distribution platform for food and grocery products that serves a network of conventional merchants in Egypt and Morocco, has announced the closing of a $40 million pre-series B equity transaction to support its growth throughout the MENAP area. The round included a number of new investors, including British International Investment…
The MENA region’s and Egypt’s mass e-commerce solution, Kenzz, announces the successful completion of a US$3.5 million seed fund campaign. Outliers Venture Capital, a venture capital firm that supports early-stage outlier creators in the US and MENA, led the funding round. Other investors, including angel investors, were Foundation Ventures, Samurai Incubate, and HOF Capital, a…
To support the expansion of its activities, the Egyptian B2B trucking marketplace Trella has obtained an additional sizeable finance facility from ALMA Sustainable Finance (ALMA) and the US International Development Finance Corporation (DFC). Trella, a transportation marketplace and B2B technology platform, links shippers and carriers in real-time. The firm, which operates across the Middle East…