Cairo-based Yodawy, a health-tech company that provides an online pharmacy marketplace and enterprise solutions in the sector, has topped up its extended Series B funding round with $16 million, after scooping up $7.5 million in July 2021.
The fresh funding was co-led by Delivery Hero Ventures and Global Ventures, with participation from AAIC Investment and returning investors MEVP, C-Ventures and P1 Ventures.
The company plans to use the fresh funding to drive the growth of its signature Care Programme for chronic patients, continue to automate its operations as well as support its regional expansion strategy.
Founded in 2018 by Karim Khashaba, Yasser Abdel Gawad and Sherief El-Feky, the health-tech startup offers a marketplace where patients can process prescriptions and place an online order for medicines. Yodawy also connects patients to medical labs and insurance companies.
The startup said its platform has processed over four million prescriptions to date, and partnered with 20 health insurance companies, 3,000 pharmacies and more than 300 corporates in Egypt since its Series A round.
Yodawy had previously raised $1 million in a Series A round led by Algebra Ventures and Egyptian lender CIB’s arm CVentures, with the participation of angel investor network ASI Ventures in 2019.
Sendmarc
Rosebank-based Sendmarc that helps protect users from email phishing and impersonation attacks, has secured $7 million in a Series A funding round led by Atlantica Ventures with participation from Allan Gray E-Squared Ventures, Fireball Capital, Endeavor Catalyst, 4Di Capital, Kalon Venture Partners, Endeavor Harvest, and Alpha Private Capital.
The funding will be used to expand Sendmarc’s market enablement strategy and to continue improving its product.
Sendmarc enables organisations to swiftly configure email security protocols to authorise legitimate senders. It actively enforces its email and domain security protection for thousands of companies worldwide, including stock exchanges, banks, insurance companies, tech companies, retailers, municipalities, law firms, and law enforcement agencies in North America, Europe, Australia, South Africa, and Latin America.
Sendmarc first raised seed capital in January 2020 when it first launched, from Kalon Venture Partners, a Johannesburg based technology venture capital company. Kalon later topped up its bet.
The five-year-old startup was created by Sam Hutchinson, Keith Thompson and Sacha Matulovich.
Gameball
Egypt-based marketing CRM platform Gameball has secured $3.5 million in a seed round led by 500 Global, Africa-focused funds P1 Ventures and Launch Africa, as well as Middle East firms Seedra Ventures, Arzan Ventures, Propeller and Core Vision, alongside regional angel investors.
Founded in 2020 by Ahmed Khairy, Ahmed El Assy and Omar Alfar, Gameball helps consumer brands create personalised engagement with customers and monetise their customer base.
Gameball will use the funds to accelerate product commercialisation, accelerate enterprise customer acquisition and strategic hiring.
Since its launch, Gameball has served more than 7,000 businesses, 20 million consumers, and says it processes over $260 million worth of transactions every month. As part of its growth strategy, Gameball will operationalise teams in Saudi Arabia, Germany and the United Kingdom while investing in the commercialisation of its product.
Chari
Chari, a Moroccan B2B e-commerce firm with embedded financing for the FMCG sector that scooped up $1 million from Endeavor Catalyst as it stayed on course for its Series A funding, has raised $1 million from Orange Ventures, Orange’s venture capital investment arm.
Previously, Chari raised an undisclosed amount in the bridge round at a valuation of $100 million. This was a mark-up of more than 40% over the post-money valuation of $70 million at which it had raised a record seed cheque of $5 million in October 2021. The bridge round was led by Saudi Arabia-based venture capital fund Khwarizmi Ventures. AirAngels (Airbnb Alumni Investors) and Afri Mobility, the venture capital arm of AKWA Group, also took part in the round.
Chari was founded in 2020 by entrepreneur couple Sophia Alj and Ismael Belkhayat. It aims to digitise the FMCG sector in French-speaking Africa by providing convenience stores with the ability to order the products they need.
The platform has onboarded over 20,000 food businesses in Morocco.
Sand-to-Green
Moroccan agri-tech firm Sand-to-Green has secured $1 million seed funding from Norwegian Katapult and pre-seed fund Catalyst.
Founded in 2021 by Benjamin Rombaut, Sand-to-Green seeks to provide a long-term solution to the problems of desertification, land degradation and food security.
The money will be used to prepare for the large-scale deployment of its Moroccan and African projects.
PressOne Africa
PressOne Africa, a startup building business phone system aimed at small and medium enterprises, has raised $600,000 in a pre-seed funding round led by Ventures Platform, along with participation from Voltron Capital among other angel investors.
Founded by Mayowa Okegbenle and Opeyemi Shokunbi, PressOne helps business owners monitor all customer phone conversations made by staff or team members enabling them to track conversations, see notes and follow-up with customers.
Before founding PressOne Africa, Okegbenle co-founded Klein Devort with Shola Akinlade (Paystack CEO). Precurio, their flagship product, was an internal business collaboration tool used by thousands of businesses globally. It was launched in 2008, and offered services in seven languages. Shokunbi worked at Nestle for over a decade, built and maintained IT infrastructure and was Technology Operations Lead, before leaving to start PressOne.
Teraki
Teraki, an online audio platform based in Ethiopia, co-founded by Nahom Tsegaye and Abel Engida, has raised an undisclosed amount from Renew Capital. The platform offers audiobooks and podcasts in various Ethiopian languages.
The founders started the project in 2019 with a small budget of $2,000, and by November of 2022, the platform had 38,000 users.
The investment by Renew Capital is expected to help Teraki expand its reach globally, especially among the diaspora.
Yebo Fresh
South African e-commerce startup Yebo Fresh that focuses on groceries and food, has raised ZAR78 million ($4.5 million) in a pre-Series A equity investment led by Enza Capital with participation from Swiss impact investor Elea Foundation, Endeavor Harvest and existing backer E4E Africa. The startup also snagged a grant from Jobs Fund.
The five-year-old venture started by Jessica Boonstra, the startup says it delivers to more than 25 townships in the greater Cape Town and Johannesburg areas. It also offers a buy-now-pay-later option.
Nambu
South African agri-tech venture Nambu Group, which if focused on animal feed using the larvae of the Black Soldier Fly, has secured an undisclosed amount in seed funding from E Squared Investments, an existing backer of the firm.
Founded and led by Lowell Scarr, Nambu intends to use the money to hire people, upgrade and expand its Black Soldier Fly production facilities, improve product sales revenues and increase the sustainability of the business.
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