Eight African Startups Make It To The Second Cohort of GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund
GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund announced its cohort of 15 startups with 8 African startups securing their place in the group.
The GSMA Ecosystem Accelerator Innovation Fund that was launched last year, received over 550 applications from more than 40 countries for this round. The startups selected for 2018 grant have a pronouncedfocus on using mobile innovation to help solve local problems and will be granted up to USD 350,000 in equity free funding.
The Fund’s previous year’s nine-strong portfolio, also included seven African startups.
Picked up start-ups, coming from Africa and Asia-Pacific region, are toiling hard to disrupt the health, insurance, and logisitics sectors among others. In order to help these startups develop sustainable businesses, the accelerator shall offer technical assistance and the opportunity to partner with mobile operators in their respective markets apart from the grant. Applications for round 3 will open on March 12, 2018.
The selected African startups, hail from multiple countries namely – Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia.
Here is a quick snapshot of the 8 Startups:
Lynk : This Kenya based startup is a platform hiring people for jobs.They want to keep these opportunities safe, convenient, and fair.
Farmcrowdy: Nigeria’s agritech Farmcrowdy, which raised seed money of USD 1 Mn last year, secured a grant money of USD 3,25,000 in this round. It is an online platform for connecting sponsors with small scale agriculturist.
MaTontine: This Senegal based startup gets access to financial services for the financially excluded part of the country.
SudPay: Also from Senegal, this startup digitises the tax collection process for the municipalities.
Jamii Africa: Tanzania based Jamii Africa is a health Tech that digitises the health insurance products.
Ensibuuko : This Uganda based startup mobilises money using cloud-based technology for non-banking institutions.
LipaMobile: Ugandan fintech startup, Lipamobile is an online mPayment platform to send and receive mobile money across all networks in Uganda.
Musanga Logistics: This is a on- demand delivery app from Zambia, connecting retailers with local courier service providers to enable them to make fast and hassle free deliveries.
