5 African startups have been accepted into the Y Combinator’s summer 2022 (YC S22) batch out of the 146 startups that applied.
The accelerator behemoth initially announced the 4 startups chosen on its directory and later added 1 more to make it a total of 5. The S22 batch of the Y Combinator program, which was influential in the success of companies such as Airbnb, Dropbox, Coinbase, Etc., is taking place, and it concludes in September with a demo day.
The accelerator also increased its standard deal size to $500,000. Previously it invested $125,000 per 7% equity, but now it has added and will invest $375,000 on an uncapped SAFE with “Most Favored Nation” (MFN) terms. This means that each startup will now be receiving $500,000 in funding.
The previous accelerator, the W22 batch, had the most African representatives in its history, with 24 African startups participating, while the S22 batch already has 5 confirmed members from the 156 which applied. The 5 startups which have been confirmed for this program include:
Pivo Technology
Founding date: 2021
Founders: Ijeoma Akwiwu and Nkiru Amadi-Emina
This startup was created by 2 women who have had a lot of experience in running supply chain businesses which prompted them to launch Pivo technology to address the issue of powering supply chain SMEs by providing quick and flexible financing options, starting with lending.
Their model is large when you notice that only SMEs contributed $250 billion to the African economy as of 2019. Since they have noticed this trend, they have decided to position themselves as a neobank providing services for traders in Africa.
Actually, in the African space, the credit market already has a lot of big players, with Flutterwave being the biggest in the industry, but Pivo has focused on a more abandoned sub-niche, which is “lending in the supply chain sector”.
To infiltrate the market, Pivo introduced a program called Pivo Capital, a credit-focused financial services platform to provide funds for supply chain SMEs. With the aid of Freight Carriers, Truck owners and drivers can use the platform to create a bank account and payment solutions for their business. They have also introduced new programs such as Invoice Factoring and Pivo Plus, designed for Insurance and corporate compliance offerings, but they are still in their testing stage.
Read: Cartona Secures $12 Million in Funding
Chowdeck
Founding date: October 2021
Founders: Femi Aluko, Lanre Yusuf, and Olumide Ojo
This startup was founded by 2 major employees of Paystack, who held engineering roles, and Lanre Yusuf, the ex-engineering lead at Crown Interactive. They are presently based in Lagos, Nigeria, which is Africa’s most populous city with over 20 million residents in the city. The company has a variety of restaurants on the platform, which enables the user to choose from any of their choices and order any local or International dish that will be delivered to them in a nick of time.
The company has stated that the variety of restaurants it hosts on its platform has assured it (Chowdeck) of exposure and growth to more countries. The companies also pride themselves on being a startup birthed to fix the problem of food orders due to the massive change in consumer behaviour towards it.
Due to some factors, most residents of Lagos have changed their approach to food services, which was the major factor in Chowdeck’s massive growth as most of the populace decided to try out other platforms aside from the popular ones. In the 1st Quarter of 2022, the startup has claimed to have delivered over 60,000 meals in only 6 months, from January to June.
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Patika
Founding date: 2021
Founders: Phelix Juma and Sidney Rema
Patika, which is a fintech startup, was created by 2 Kenyans with the motive and aim to help provide smaller businesses with the capacity to track customer debt, facilitate repayments and manage cash flow to aid their business. It is the only startup enrolled in the Y Combinator’s summer batch, not from the West African region but from the eastern side of Africa.
The Co-founder and CTO, Phelix Juma, has described the startup as the solution to eradicate the traditional methods of debt tracking and repayments monitoring, which according to him, was the reason over 60% of debts weren’t repaid on time, which caused a loss of $2000 to businesses affected.
In a statement on LinkedIn, Juma wrote:
“We are automating previously manual processes like phone call-based repayments reminders, billings, payments, and reconciliations with a vision to grow into a full-stack neobank for Africa’s small businesses”.
According to the latest statistics from the Kenyan National Bureau of Statistics, over 1000 SMEs die daily due to inadequate bookkeeping despite contributing 45.5% of Kenya’s gross domestic product and employing 86% of the Kenyan population.
The introduction of Patika alongside new products would help SMEs grow and scale and access credit and full business automation software.
Garage Mobility
Founding date: 2021
Founders: Cedric Foudjet and Gwanygha’a Gana
Based in Accra, this startup aims to get motor parts from top sellers and distributors worldwide and process an efficient supply chain system that directly delivers these parts to retailers. According to Gana, the startup was birthed out of personal experience as the people of his hometown in Cameroon bought motor parts at exorbitant prices, which brought about disconnection in the supply chain. He aims to fix this problem with Garage Mobility.
Moneco
Founding date: 2022
Founders: Bilal Dahlab, Shams Radjabaly, and Kuassi Jimmy Kumako.
This new startup focus is a neo bank that focuses majorly on migrants in Europe. They claim to have a social impact spin on their business model, which will make banking more seamless and affordable to underserved communities in Europe. They are the only startup accepted into Y Combinator the same year they began operations. The company in the long term looks to be a one-stop shop where all users can have their financial needs solved.
Y Combinator has proven to be one of the top investors in Africa as they have been mentioned various times investing in one platform or the other but have been rewarded immensely as they gave birth to some big companies we know. This Summer 2022 batch will be no different as it aims to equip startups with resources to become top players in their industries.