Google has selected 50 startups drawn from Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Ethiopia, Cameroon, Rwanda, Zambia, and Cote d’Ivoire to take part in the Africa Investment Fund program.
In Kenya, 9 startups made it to the list, and will receive up to Ksh. 11 million ($100,000) in equity-free funding. The startups will also receive access to Google employees, network, and technologies including Google Ad Grants and Cloud credits.
The 9 Kenyans startups are the following.
1. Amitruck: Amitruck connects clients directly with transporters, cutting out expensive middlemen. Named as a Top Startup to Watch in Africa, Amitruck paved the way to a new deal in African logistics and supply chain thanks to digitalization, now extended to the last mile. Amitruck has had an exciting 12 months with its revenues growing by over 300% despite the COVID-19 crisis.
2. Angaza Elimu: Angaza Elimu is an EdTech startup focused on delivering quality and relevant education on-demand using AI. The startup addresses the problem of inefficient classrooms and inadequate
quality educational material.
3. AquaRech: AquaRech is an AgTech that infuses IoT, farm management, and use of high-quality feeds to improve the productivity of small-scale fish farmers and linking the produced fish to traders. The startup provides vital production metrics such as feed conversion ratio, average daily growth, mortality rates, and water temperature.
4. Raise: Raise helps African startups, investors and employees to track equity and distribute digital securities in their portfolios.
5. Finplus: Finplus fintech company enables SME retailers to have access to instant working capital by providing transaction transparency to Consumer Goods companies and Banks.
6. WorkPay: Originally known as TozzaPlus, WorkPay is a cloud-based human resources management and payroll solution for small and medium-sized businesses (SMBs) in Africa. The startup provides businesses with tools to enable them better and efficiently manage their employees.
7. Pezesha: Pezesha is Kenya SME Lender that helps connect SMEs to banks or financial institutions for them to access affordable working capital. The company has built an end-to-end digital API infrastructure that helps to determine the credit score of these SMEs, and match them with lenders.
8. MarketForce: MarketForce is a Kenyan-based B2B platform for retail distribution of consumer goods and digital financial services in Africa. Co-founded in 2018 by Tesh Mbaabu and Mesongo Sibuti, MarketForce uniquely combines a field sales automation SaaS solution with its “RejaReja” B2B marketplace to digitize how informal retail merchants buy and sell FMCGs and digital financial services.
9. Imali Pay: Imali Pay is a one-stop-shop of financial services for the gig economy. The startup offers gig workers a one-stop-shop of financial services such as the ability to seamlessly save their income and receive in-kind loans through a “buy now, pay later” model tied to their trade.