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The potential for crowdfunding has been much discussed in Africa over the past few years, but the space got a real shot in the arm last month with a notable funding round for South Africa’s Uprise.Africa.

Launched in October last year, equity crowdfunding platform Uprise.Africa aims to help innovative local businesses raise capital while gaining market validation. Two campaigns have been hosted on the platform so far – one failing to gain any traction; the other exceeding its raising target.

Last month it secured an undisclosed amount of funding from Silicon Valley-based VC firm Nexxus Ventures, based on a ZAR60 million (US$4.2 million) valuation of the company, to enable it to launch new deals on its platform in the coming months. Uprise.Africa and Nexxus will partner on identifying high-potential South African businesses seeking funding for expansion.

From the team behind project-based crowdfunding platform Thundafund, Uprise.Africa is a leader in the equity crowdfunding space in South Africa, but crowdfunding in general is also taking off across the continent. There have been recent launches in countries like Rwanda, Libya and Angola as platforms look to provide funding-starved entrepreneurs with alternative ways of financing their businesses.

Patrick Schofield is the founder of Thundafund and Uprise.Africa. He agrees crowdfunding is on the move on the continent, but says it is becoming established in ways that are locally appropriate.

“Where your traditional models of of equity, debt, rewards and donations crowdfunding lead the fields internationally, what we are seeing Africa is variants of these being established more linked to existing funding structures. In all countries in Africa that have reasonable internet penetration, local crowdfunding platforms have been launched,” he said.

Some barriers still remain to be overcome, however. Schofield says the concept of crowdfunding is still often misunderstood by people who know the term but not the detail.

“Trust, however, is more difficult to establish and takes time and some good examples of success, regardless of whether it has been shown as a reputable business model on the international stage. People want to see it work in practice, in the local context,” he said.

“On the donations crowdfunding front, it is quickly gaining traction. On the investment front, regulatory frameworks and exchange control structure are still a barrier to growth.”

Regulation, moreover,varies hugely from country to country. In South Africa, the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA) has established a formal licencing structure, while in Rwanda the regulator is open to work with pioneers in the industry to build the regulatory structure as they develop. Other countries, however, are further behind.

Yet the concept of crowdfunding is not new to Africa. The community funding of causes is an age-old format. In Kenya, the tradition of “harambee” sees communities club together to hold events such as weddings and funerals, and M-Pesa is bringing tech to this concept by setting up a wallet that allows people to collectively contribute.

Kenyan startup M-Changa is taking this a step further with its online platform that allows people to post campaigns, raising for things like events, school fees and medical treatment, and fundraise from wider networks.

“Crowdfunding in the sense of community fundraising has existed in Africa for centuries. M-Changa can be described as a digital harambee for instant understanding of the concept in Kenya,” said general manager Matt Roberts-Davies.

“Crowdfunding makes it possible for someone to raise funds in a secure, transparent and convenient way. This makes crowdfunding incredibly valuable where trust is rare, such as in East Africa. It might take some time for the concept to go mainstream as it has globally.”

He agrees with Schofield, however, that challenges are still prevalent in terms of encouraging uptake.

“The need to use such a platform can be difficult since people are used to raising funds in their own way and are reluctant to switch,” said Roberts-Davies.

“The idea of using a technology platform is new. It is picked up easily by those who are well educated and exposed. This digital form of crowdfunding is important because of the transparency, it has been very slow to catch on in Africa however.”

The future is bright, however.

“I see different types of platforms emerging to include rewards, real estate, peer-to-peer lending and equity,” he said.

“As payments become more digital, all forms of crowdfunding are likely to improve.”

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Egyptian e-health startup Vezeeta has raised additional funding from IFC to add to the US$12 million in Series C financing it raised earlier this year to continue its international expansion.

Launched in 2015 in Cairo, Vezeeta allows users to find and book appointments with over 10,000 doctors, and is also available in Jordan and Saudi Arabia. The startup has managed three million bookings in the region and served 2.5 million patients.

In September, Vezeeta announced it had raised a US$12 million Series C funding round, which was briefly the largest single round ever raised by an Egyptian tech startup until ridesharing startup Swvl topped it in November. It has now secured an additional investment from IFC to help it continue with its expansion drive.

“IFC is a global power that will not only help fuel our growth but also bridge us to an incredible global network,” said Amir Barsoum, Vezeeta’s founder and chief executive officer (CEO).

The investment comes as part of IFC’s broader efforts to support entrepreneurship and to expand financial access to startups to create new markets. Last week it selected 100 startups from across the continent to take part in its Next Startups initiative.

“Startups like Vezeeta have the power to drive innovation in the Middle East and Africa,” said IFC CEO Philippe Le Houérou. “Entrepreneurs across the African continent have enormous creativity and drive – and they’re using the power of new technologies to tackle the region’s most formidable social and economic challenges.”

Vezeeta chief technology officer (CTO) Adel Khalil said the startup would continue to empower millions of patients in the region through data and new products in healthcare, ensuring that patients and healthcare providers are seamlessly integrated and engaged.

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South African startup Pineapple has been accepted into the Hartford Insurtech Hub accelerator programme as it prepares to launch its product in the United States (US).

Pineapple, which raised funding last year and took part in Google’s Launchpad Africa accelerator earlier this year, is the world’s first insurance network, allowing members to insure things with the snap of a picture and keep all unused premium.

It is one of 10 teams from across the world accepted into the Connecticut-based Hartford Insurtech Hub, powered by Startupbootcamp, which strives to partner insurtech startups across the globe with insurance companies in the US

The three-month programme, which received more than 230 applications, begins in February, and offers startups the support, resources and industry and investor connections they need to help grow their businesses.

Pineapple co-founder Matthew Elan Smith told Disrupt Africa the startup was participating in the accelerator programme in an attempt to partner with insurance companies in the US ahead of a planned launch in the country.

“Getting into the Hartford Insurtech Hub is going to be a big catalyst to us launching Pineapple in the US,” he said.

“It gives us access to a huge network of mentors and professionals in the industry there as well as engagement with US carriers to partner up with. We are super excited for the opportunity because being able to take a proudly South Africa-built product into the US market will be a massive achievement.”

Fellow co-founder Marnus van Heerden said the ecosystem created by Hartford Insurtech Hub was “amazing”, demonstrating what a public-private partnership should look like.

“The mayor of Hartford was there, their head of regulation was their, they even have a state run venture capital arm. To back this up they invited all the major insurance companies, VCs and experts from across the board ranging from IP lawyers to design experts,” he said.

The state of Connecticut is positioning itself as the global hub for insurtech business, in much the same way as Silicon Valley is for venture capital in general. Its two advantages in this respect are the fact it is already the insurance hub of the US, and its proximity to both New York and Boston, which gives entrepreneurs based in Hartford access to resources from these cities without incurring the high cost of living there.

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Angolan taxi app Kubinga is expanding to four other provinces of the country after strong initial uptake in the capital Luanda, and is also targeting other Portuguese-speaking African countries.

A simple app following the Uber model, Kubinga is operating essentially uninhibited by competition in Angola, connecting riders with drivers via its platform.

The startup, which was formed in November of last year and launched its service this January, was recently named winner of the Angolan leg of the Seedstars World competition, and will head to the global final in Switzerland next year to pitch for up to US$1 million in equity investment.

However, Kubinga has more local expansion on its mind after hitting almost 50 registered drivers, 4,300 downloads and 4,500 paid rides in Luanda since its launch, with chief executive officer (CEO) Emerson Paim telling Disrupt Africa it has immediate plans to move into four other provinces in the country – Huila, Huambo, Benguela and Namibe.

“Next year we will be looking for opportunities in African Portuguese-speaking countries, the SADC and more,” he said.

Though in all reality a clone of Uber in a nation in which the global giant is unlikely to launch anytime soon, Kubinga has found a potentially valuable market for itself. Thirteen million Angolans use mobile phones, and there is no other real taxi app active in the market.

“Our main competitor is Allo Taxi, which has a normal taxi service with a reservation application system that doesn´t provide a driver’s present location and does not offer price prediction,” Paim said. “Compared to them, our price is very affordable and our application provides extra features.”

The Kubinga team has self-funded its own growth, which currently stands at 60 per cent month-on-month.

“We have already started a small contract of a merchandise delivery service, which transports domestic cleaning products from a factory straight to the client, on behalf of a telesale company,” Paim said.

Kubinga takes a 25 per cent commission on each completed ride, with Paim saying revenues are increasing with usage and as more drivers come on board.

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Nigerian logistics startup Kobo360 has secured a US$6 million funding round to support further growth from a host of investors.

Launched in July 2016, Kobo360 enables individuals and businesses to request or schedule pickup of packages and track the driver until its final destination. It claims to be democratising transportation in the way it aggregates supply or logistics agents.

The startup, which raised US$1.2 million in pre-seed funding ahead of taking part in the Y Combinator accelerator earlier this year, has now secured US$6 million in an investment round led by IFC and also involving YCombinator, WTI, Cardinal Stone Partners, Chandaria Capital, and TLcom.

“We are excited to have our new investors to support us in redesigning transportation and logistics in Africa, and across emerging markets, by building a Global Logistics Operating System (G-LOS) to power new frontiers in trade and commerce,” said Obi Ozor, founder and chief executive officer (CEO) of Kobo360.

“Our motivation remains to aggressively reduce logistics frictions for large enterprises and SMEs, and connect new markets, and in the process unlock better wellbeing and opportunities across communities.”

Kobo360 currently has 5,000 trucks empaneled on its platform, from over 600 small fleet owners, serving some of the largest enterprises in Nigeria.

“IFC is committed to supporting the digital economy and young entrepreneurs in Nigeria and across Africa. IFC’s investment in Kobo demonstrates how disruptive technologies can enhance the development of key sectors and contribute to Nigeria’s economic diversification. This is an innovative startup that is making company operations more efficient and lowering transport costs,” said Philippe Le Houérou, CEO of IFC.

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South African startup Snapt has raised US$3 million in Series A funding to expand sales and marketing efforts globally, including expansion of its US presence and worldwide channel programme, in addition to key research and development initiatives.

Snapt, which was founded in South Africa in 2012 and is a provider of software-based load balancers and application delivery controllers (ADCs), established an independent sales and marketing arm in the United States (US) in 2015 to cope with increasing demand and last secured investment in 2016 when it raised US$1 million.

As it continues to innovate in the ADC market, the company is working to address the changing nature of network architecture in response to growing data and security concerns, while developing new protocols that define how applications are delivered.

The new US$3 million round sees existing investor Convergence Partners joined by two additional investors – Nedbank, through its Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB) division, and Sanari Capital, which specialises in high-growth emerging market opportunities.

“Our continued investment in Snapt is due to our belief in their vision that there is a software revolution happening, and that their software-based ADC helps developers take advantage of this and optimize their applications and infrastructure at the root,” said Andile Ngcaba, chairman of Convergence Partners. “We look forward to working with them during their expansion into new markets and opportunities.”

Johann van Zyl of Nedbank CIB’s venture capital business said Snapt offered a new approach to the ADC market, and has made great progress building a solid product.

“We are impressed by their strong customer traction in enterprise, and are aligned with their vision of a software-based ADC for DevOps. We see tremendous room for innovation as organisations move to the cloud and deploy containers and other new infrastructure. We look forward to partnering with the very dedicated Snapt team during this next phase of growth,” he said.

Currently used by companies ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies, Snapt has developed an ADC that is easy to use and deploy, and is built around modern models and use cases with key value offerings including flexibility of environments and user empowerment.

“The ADC market is evolving quickly, and Snapt is the perfect product to meet companies’ needs for more advanced ADC solutions that are designed for DevOps, including cloud, cloud-native and virtualized deployments,” said Dave Blakey, Snapt’s co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO). “We are very pleased to have developed a strong network of partners that can help drive our expansion and support our rapidly growing customer base as we execute the next stage of our IP strategy, ensuring that we continue to bring the most advanced ADC solutions to market.”

The post SA’s Snapt raises $3m Series A funding round appeared first on Disrupt Africa.

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South African startup Snapt has raised US$3 million in Series A funding to expand sales and marketing efforts globally, including expansion of its US presence and worldwide channel programme, in addition to key research and development initiatives.

Snapt, which was founded in South Africa in 2012 and is a provider of software-based load balancers and application delivery controllers (ADCs), established an independent sales and marketing arm in the United States (US) in 2015 to cope with increasing demand and last secured investment in 2016 when it raised US$1 million.

As it continues to innovate in the ADC market, the company is working to address the changing nature of network architecture in response to growing data and security concerns, while developing new protocols that define how applications are delivered.

The new US$3 million round sees existing investor Convergence Partners joined by two additional investors – Nedbank, through its Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB) division, and Sanari Capital, which specialises in high-growth emerging market opportunities.

“Our continued investment in Snapt is due to our belief in their vision that there is a software revolution happening, and that their software-based ADC helps developers take advantage of this and optimize their applications and infrastructure at the root,” said Andile Ngcaba, chairman of Convergence Partners. “We look forward to working with them during their expansion into new markets and opportunities.”

Johann van Zyl of Nedbank CIB’s venture capital business said Snapt offered a new approach to the ADC market, and has made great progress building a solid product.

“We are impressed by their strong customer traction in enterprise, and are aligned with their vision of a software-based ADC for DevOps. We see tremendous room for innovation as organisations move to the cloud and deploy containers and other new infrastructure. We look forward to partnering with the very dedicated Snapt team during this next phase of growth,” he said.

Currently used by companies ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies, Snapt has developed an ADC that is easy to use and deploy, and is built around modern models and use cases with key value offerings including flexibility of environments and user empowerment.

“The ADC market is evolving quickly, and Snapt is the perfect product to meet companies’ needs for more advanced ADC solutions that are designed for DevOps, including cloud, cloud-native and virtualized deployments,” said Dave Blakey, Snapt’s co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO). “We are very pleased to have developed a strong network of partners that can help drive our expansion and support our rapidly growing customer base as we execute the next stage of our IP strategy, ensuring that we continue to bring the most advanced ADC solutions to market.”

The post SA’s Snapt raises $3m Series A funding round appeared first on Disrupt Africa.

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South African startup Snapt has raised US$3 million in Series A funding to expand sales and marketing efforts globally, including expansion of its US presence and worldwide channel programme, in addition to key research and development initiatives.

Snapt, which was founded in South Africa in 2012 and is a provider of software-based load balancers and application delivery controllers (ADCs), established an independent sales and marketing arm in the United States (US) in 2015 to cope with increasing demand and last secured investment in 2016 when it raised US$1 million.

As it continues to innovate in the ADC market, the company is working to address the changing nature of network architecture in response to growing data and security concerns, while developing new protocols that define how applications are delivered.

The new US$3 million round sees existing investor Convergence Partners joined by two additional investors – Nedbank, through its Corporate and Investment Banking (CIB) division, and Sanari Capital, which specialises in high-growth emerging market opportunities.

“Our continued investment in Snapt is due to our belief in their vision that there is a software revolution happening, and that their software-based ADC helps developers take advantage of this and optimize their applications and infrastructure at the root,” said Andile Ngcaba, chairman of Convergence Partners. “We look forward to working with them during their expansion into new markets and opportunities.”

Johann van Zyl of Nedbank CIB’s venture capital business said Snapt offered a new approach to the ADC market, and has made great progress building a solid product.

“We are impressed by their strong customer traction in enterprise, and are aligned with their vision of a software-based ADC for DevOps. We see tremendous room for innovation as organisations move to the cloud and deploy containers and other new infrastructure. We look forward to partnering with the very dedicated Snapt team during this next phase of growth,” he said.

Currently used by companies ranging from startups to Fortune 500 companies, Snapt has developed an ADC that is easy to use and deploy, and is built around modern models and use cases with key value offerings including flexibility of environments and user empowerment.

“The ADC market is evolving quickly, and Snapt is the perfect product to meet companies’ needs for more advanced ADC solutions that are designed for DevOps, including cloud, cloud-native and virtualized deployments,” said Dave Blakey, Snapt’s co-founder and chief executive officer (CEO). “We are very pleased to have developed a strong network of partners that can help drive our expansion and support our rapidly growing customer base as we execute the next stage of our IP strategy, ensuring that we continue to bring the most advanced ADC solutions to market.”

The post SA’s Snapt raises $3m Series A funding round appeared first on Disrupt Africa.

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Afro-optimism is returning to Africa as the continent looks to leverage its huge youth dividend; however, this potential will not be realised without governments and stakeholders collaborating to remove the issues and hurdles facing young entrepreneurs on the continent, writes Lamin M. Manneh, director at the United Nations Development Programme’s (UNDP) regional service for Africa.

The decade and a half through 2015 witnessed a level of optimism in Africa rarely seen before. During that period, the continent registered unprecedented uninterrupted high rates of economic since 2000, accompanied by relatively stable macroeconomic conditions, in sharp contrasts to the volatilities of the 1980s and 1990s. Consequently, the opportunities for transformation were tangible, national and pan-African visions all pointed to a continent that was potentially self-sufficient and self – confident, with higher levels of shared prosperity for all its citizens and determined to play a greater role in the global arena through reinforced collective actions as envisioned in the continent’s Vision 2063.

Although the continent’s “rising narrative” began to dim with effect from 2015, when economic growth rates started declining dramatically, and it became evident that the much desired meaningful economic transformation proved elusive, the “Afro-optimism” is gradually returning. This is being fueled by renewed hopes for economic transformation, massive infrastructure developments and greater determination to leverage the continent’s potentially huge youth dividend.

Africa boasts the fastest-growing youth population in the world. But there is consensus that for this significant youth dividend to be realised Governments and all the stakeholders have to quickly join hands to effectively address the major issues affecting the youth. Notable among them is the high and persisting levels of unemployment and underemployment. With better enabling conditions put in place and  the requisite investments devoted to creating opportunities for youth and access to other resources, it is quite likely that we will see African countries revive their economic fortunes and take their long-awaited seat at the table of nations that have been able to steer their fate towards sustained prosperity and abundance. As we realise the ambition of Africa’s youth to take the reins and build “the Africa we want”, entrepreneurship is often touted as among the solutions to the very real issue of youth unemployment. It is evident that states and the formal large and medium private sectors will not by themselves be capable of creating the numbers jobs required to absorb the rapidly growing young workers entering the job markets.

Anyone who has been bold enough to take the entrepreneurial journey will testify that the chances of any business succeeding rely heavily on an ecosystem that provides a favourable broader environment, access to the tools, resources and support that take a budding enterprises’s unique needs into consideration. More mature entrepreneurs sometimes have the advantage of time and experience as they further their goals and objectives. Young entrepreneurs face critical gaps in the opportunities presented to them. The more support they have access to, the greater their contribution could be to the development of their communities and countries and hence to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and Africa’s Vision 2063.

Information, mentorship, funding and networking are often identified by entrepreneurs as the key pillars of success when building a business that can contribute to a community’s sustainable development. In a recent study, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Regional Service Centre for Africa (RSCA) took a closer look at critical gaps in the four pillars and came to some interesting conclusions:

Information: Most youth entrepreneurship-focused initiatives aim to provide information and advisory services of some kind. Virtual platforms provide youth-entrepreneurship-specific information. However, the findings of the UNDP study suggest that generating original content is a highly resource – intensive task as information tends to be outdated after a short periods of time. Furthermore, the study indicates that what the market needs is leveraging of existing information that help entrepreneurs manoeuvre and find what is relevant to them rather than to generate new content. This is because many of the information needs of entrepreneurs are already available online in one form or the other.

Mentorship: Virtual mentoring services do have limitations, if not combined with physical face to face interactions, as entrepreneurs are not open to share detailed information without being able to trust the mentor. This relationship is usually established over time or through structured mentoring, which is more than a “once-off” event. However, while a number of initiatives provide this kind of virtual support, it is not the most strategic entry point for an online portal because of the challenges in implementation.

Finance: Providing access to finance is also a “physical activity” requiring face-to-face interaction. Financial transactions are rarely successfully made on a virtual platform. Those initiatives that have online support provide match-making support with potential capital providers rather than actually providing capital through their online platforms.

Networking: Networking opportunities for youth entrepreneurs are an important gap in the ecosystem. Many business networks focus on more mature entrepreneurs. A few fellowships exist, which build an alumni network that also has a virtual presence. However, few initiatives aim to strengthen community building among young entrepreneurs. Existing online communities leverage social media and existing platforms such as LinkedIn or Facebook. Maintaining a separate networking page is difficult to manage from a resource perspective, as it is resource intensive to curate discussions.

Taking all these insight into consideration, UNDP, in partnership with Accenture, has set out to facilitate the implementation of a pan-African entrepreneurship portal-platform, called YAS! Youth for Africa and SDGs. YAS! serves as an ecosystem catalyst, which supports the development and growth of youth entrepreneurship in Africa by creating a marketplace for ecosystem players, namely investors, large corporates and governments. The portal-platform aims to connect entrepreneurs to the resources they need to develop and grow their idea or business. Users on the platform can interact on the provided values of learning, ecosystem map, challenges and opportunities.

From a learning perspective, entrepreneurs often need key information on the processes and procedures required to become an enterprise. The YAS! portal-platform also provides an ecosystem map that enables the relevant stakeholders across the board – from corporates to entrepreneurs – to locate the different entrepreneurial ecosystem service providers. In addition, leveraging the competitive spirit inherent in entrepreneurs, the portal-platform offers challenges to award financing for youth to develop or scale and implement their innovations to achieve the SDGs Finally, entrepreneurs using the portal-platform find opportunities to learn more about funding and networking relevant for the entrepreneurship ecosystem.

If entrepreneurship is to support Africa’s youth to counter poverty and unemployment, the tools created to assist them must be innovative and speak to their most pressing needs, taking into consideration the resources already available, identifying gaps and creating flexible and effective solutions. The interventions must be fit for purpose. Most importantly, Africa needs an all-hands-on-deck approach to ensure the continent’s youth, curious about the future and bursting with ideas, are given a chance to lead us into the prosperous future we all strive for.

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The IFC has selected 100 companies to take part in its Next Startups programme, which will provide up-and-coming small businesses with funding and advice.

Disrupt Africa reported in October on the launch of the initiative, which is being run by the IFC in cooperation with Egypt’s Ministry of Investment and International Cooperation.

Designed to spur innovation and job creation across the African continent, the programme connects startups with potential investors, financial institutions, business leaders, and policymakers.

It is designed to support the continent’s budding startup culture and create opportunities for entrepreneurs, who often struggle to secure growth capital and have few places to turn for guidance.

Selected startups include Vezeeta, Avidbeam and Next Protein, with all 100 startups to attend the Africa 2018 Forum in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, which begins today.

“Africa is brimming with entrepreneurs whose drive and creativity have the potential to transform the industries in which they work,” said Philippe Le Houérou, the IFC’s chief executive officer.  “With the right support, African startups can help create the high-quality jobs that are so urgently needed while reducing poverty and finding solutions to some of the continent’s most urgent challenges.”

More than 500 business from 35 African countries applied to be part of the program. The companies selected represent those with the greatest potential to achieve a positive impact on their communities. They come from across the African continent, and operate in a range of sectors, including education, health care, logistics, and software.

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