Rabat – The pan-African tech accelerator Startupbootcamp (SBC) Afritech is partnering with the Dutch Entrepreneurial Development Bank (FMO) to coach early-stage tech startups from Morocco and other countries.
Applications for the third cohort of its Africa Startup Initiative (ASI) are set to open at the end of August and startup owners from more than 10 African countries are encouraged to participate. The list of eligible countries includes Ivory Coast, Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, Tanzania, and Ethiopia.
The selected participants will undergo three months of intensive coaching in Senegal on scaling fundamentals, among other topics, with the aim of advancing the startups’ operations in key sectors such as fintech, insuretech, agri-tech, climate-tech, e-commerce, e-health, and cleantech.
Ten of the startups will receive benefits valued at $750,000, including credits from Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Google Cloud Services, and a cash investment of $18,000, according to Startupbootcamp.
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Marieke Roestenberg, manager of FMO’s ventures program said that the bank “was keen to support Startupbootcamp AfriTech in expanding their operations into more middle-tier markets [and providing] more world-class acceleration to entrepreneurs striving to build businesses that create jobs and better livelihoods for their families and communities.”
Philip Kiracofe, the co-founder of SBC Afritech, echoed Roestenberg’s statement, saying that the pan-African incubator is determined to “empower founders with disruptive solutions.”
Fifty African startups have completed the ASI program over the past five years, with 90% of the alumni still working on scaling their operations after raising more than $110 million in follow-up funding.
Despite the continent’s continued lack of capital, quality education, and infrastructure, the African startup ecosystem has surged in terms of the number of startups and the volume of deals they have concluded.
By the first half of 2022, African startups had raised $2 billion, marking a 192% year-on-year growth. The funding resulted from 387 deals, up by 31% from the first half of 2021.
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