Startups’ funding in Q1 hits $532m – NIPC

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A total of $187.18 million was injected by foreign and local investors into thriving startups in the country in March, according to media reports.

The investments were targeted at nine young innovative companies in different levels of growth to expand their businesses.

The March record brought the total funding for Nigerian startups in the first quarter of this year to $532.18 million.

According to the various funding announcements captured by the Nigeria Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC), the country’s startups had secured $31.5 million in January, while investors injected $313.5million in February.

Leading the funding rounds for March, Nigeria based mobility fintech startup, Moove, had raised $105 million in an oversubscribed Series A2 round to scale to seven new markets across Asia, MENA, and Europe over the next six months.

Founded in2019 by Britishborn Nigerians, Ladi Delano and Jide Odunsi, Moove is democratizing vehicle ownership in Africa by providing revenue-based vehicle financing to mobility entrepreneurs.

Similarly, ThriveAgric, a technology-driven agricultural company, secured $56.4 million in debt funding from commercial banks and institutional investors.

Additionally, the company received a $1.75million coinvestment grant from West Africa Trade & Investment, which is funded by USAID. As a result of the new investment, the company will be able to expand its 200,000+ farmer base, as well as enter new markets in Africa, including Ghana, Zambia, and Kenya.

CredPal, one of the earliest pioneers of buy now, pay later in Nigeria, also closed a bridge round of $15millionin equity and debt in the month to expand its consumer credit offerings across Africa.

According to a statement shared by the company, the investment will support its expansion into other African markets, mainly Kenya, Egypt, Ghana, and Cameroon.

In the month under review, Sudo Africa, a fintech that provides a card-issuing API for developers and businesses in Nigeria, raised $3.7 million in pre-seed funding.
SanFrancisco-based Global Founders Capital (GFC) led the round.

Participating VCs include Picus Capital, Lofty- Inc Capital, Rallycap Ventures, Kepple Africa, Berrywood Capital, ZedCrest, and Suya Ventures. Several African fintech founders such as Olugbenga ‘GB’ Agboola, Ham Serunjogi, and Odun Eweniyi are investors in the company too.

In the same vein, Big Cabal Media (BCM), a leading African digital media company, announced a $2.3 million seed funding round in the month, emphasizing its commitment to keep building exciting and authoritative media products and brands.

The new investment round saw participation from existing investors: Unicorn Capital Partners and Future Africa. New investors such as Mac Venture Capital and Luminate Capital Partners participated.

Kwik, a Nigeria and French-based startup that provides logistics services to B2B merchants, from social vendors to e-commerce platforms, also raised $2 million in Series A funding.

The financing round was led by XBTO Ventures, a crypto finance company with a VC arm that invests in digital assets, among other types of startups. New and existing investors such as Humla Ventures, Nabuboto, Ubisoft CEO Yves Guillemot and Pulse Africa founder Leonard Stiegeler participated.

In the same month, Yep!, a “financial super app” with payments, remittance and banking features raised $1.5 million in a pre-seed round led by pan-AfricanVC, Greenhouse Capital.

The San Francisco- and Lagos-headquartered startup reportedly had over 5 million customers transact more than $2 billion from its network of 100,000 merchants.

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