Nigeria’s Co-Creation Hub (CcHub) is raising US$60 million for its Growth Capital investment arm to back startups across Africa in the wake of its expansion into Kenya with the acquisition of iHub.
CcHub’s Growth Capital is a social innovation fund that supports high potential, early-stage businesses building next generation infrastructure. Its pilot fund has made six investments, in Nigerian startups Taeillo, LifeBank, Riby, Edves, Delivery Science and DrugStoc.
This is in addition to the 25 startups that CcHub has invested in directly via its angel fund and in-house incubation programme, and the hub is now in the process of raising a larger amount of capital in order to make investments across Africa. Chief executive officer (CEO) Bosun Tijani told Disrupt Africa the fund was currently in the process of raising US$60 million, which he hoped would be completed within the next 12 months.
This new, bigger Growth Capital fund will make investments in startups across the continent. CcHub has been expanding of late, launching a Rwandan hub in February and just last week announcing the acquisition of the Nairobi iHub. The deal brought two of Africa’s flagship tech hubs together to form a pan-African entity focused on accelerating the growth of tech innovation and entrepreneurship.
The iHub, launched in 2010 and home to internationally-recognised companies such as BRCK and Ushahidi, will retain its name and senior management structure, with Tijani becoming CEO across both locations.
Startups in Rwanda and Kenya will be among the beneficiaries of the enlarged Growth Capital fund, as will those from other African countries. The fund also sees iHub indirectly fulfil a pledge made in December 2016, when it said it planned to raise a pan-African investment vehicle of its own.
