The Nigerian edtech startup AltSchool Africa says it is the African version of the US coding bootcamp BloomTech.
Intellecap, an advisory firm focusing on Asia and Africa, will help AltSchool Africa with its strategy. It was learned that the program, paid for in full by the Rwandan Innovation Fund, will help AltSchool plan for its next growth stage.
Pitchbook data shows that in April 2023, AltSchool raised $3 million. Angaza Capital, a venture capital company that helps run the Rwandan Innovation Fund, was one of the investors in that round. This investment has not been talked about before. Altschol’s CEO, Adewale Yusuf, admitted that the innovation fund gave money to his company, but he wouldn’t say how much.
Read also: Nigeria’s AltSchool Africa launches new schools for Africans
The African Development Bank loaned $30 million to set up the Rwandan Innovation Fund in 2021. This was part of the country’s plan to become an African technology hub. “The Rwandan government has been beneficial to our success since we entered the market, and we’re thankful for that,” Yusuf wrote on LinkedIn.
Yusuf told Media that AltSchool built a Rwandan office at the Norrsken hub last year, one of the first African companies wooed by Rwanda. It has four employees and is employing more. Flutterwave opened an East African settlement hub earlier this year, and Paystack announced Rwanda development plans. More firms will follow.
The Rwandan Innovation Fund needs $30 million from private investors and $8.6 million from the government in addition to the AfDB loan. The fund supports 150 tech-enabled enterprises, ten incubators and accelerators, and 20 early-stage growth prospects across Africa. The Fund has invested $6.6 million in 11 East African businesses.
AltSchool and What it Has to Offer Online
AltSchool only lets you learn online. Its curriculum is much more thorough than BloomTech’s, covering business, data, engineering, media, and the creative economy. You can take those courses for $20 to $50 a month, and the company uses an income-sharing agreement (ISA) model, which is famous for online education startups like ALX. The company tries to match students with internships so that this can happen. You are trying to make sure that they get jobs in the end.
AltSchool has helped about 20,000 students in eight African countries so far. The startup has promised to give young Africans the information and skills they need to build long-term careers in and out of the tech industry. In Africa, youth unemployment has been a problem for a long time. Only about 3 million of the 10 million young people who join the job market can find work or make enough money to live on. Edtechs like AltSchool help kids learn skills that are in demand worldwide.
VCs and private investors gave AltSchool $1 million in pre-seed funding in 2022. This was its second round of funding. Some of the VCs in the round were Voltron Capital and Obda VC. Sola Akinlade from Paystack and Nigerian singer Folarin “Falz” Falana also participated.