Nine early-stage Kenyan startups have been selected to take part in the Spark Accelerator programme, an initiative of Safaricom, M-Pesa Africa and Sumitomo Corporation that seeks to grow and scale commercially-viable businesses that are creating societal change.
Safaricom first launched the Spark Venture Fund back in 2014, to invest and support late-seed, early growth stage companies with a presence in Kenya, whilst leveraging Safaricom assets to enable the companies to scale. The US$1 million fund made six investments.
Disrupt Africa reported in January the mobile operator had partnered M-Pesa Africa and Sumitomo Corporation, a leading Fortune 500 global trading and business investment company, to open applications for another edition. The three-month accelerator programme will provide a blend of training, mentorship, funding and go-to-market support to spark the growth and scale of ventures that come into the accelerator and set them up for long-term success.
Nine Kenyan startups have been selected to take part, including Chumz, which is leveraging mobile money, gamification, and behavioural psychology to build a community of savers; Nobuk, which is streamlining payment collection and reconciliation for African groups and collectives; Chpter which empowers businesses to sell more on social platforms; Faidi HR, an all-in-one cloud payroll and HR platform for businesses; and Churpy, which seeks to automate repetitive and manual tasks in the office of the CFO.
Completing the cohort are Twiva, a social-commerce platform that helps brands to effectively gain access to markets by leveraging social media influencers to market their goods and services; HealthX Africa, a data-driven, primary health care provider offering hybrid digital and physical touch points; BlackRhino VR, which enables creators and brands to tell immersive and interactive stories; and VunaPay, a platform for agricultural cooperatives that facilitates instant payment to smallholder farmers for produce delivered.
“Leveraging technology to drive meaningful innovation is a strong premise under which the Spark Accelerator programme was founded. By supporting and investing in these tech-enabled startups, we aim to drive significant societal change and economic growth. We are excited to work with visionary founders who represent the promise of tomorrow and to see the impact they will create in their respective sectors,” said Peter Ndegwa, CEO of Safaricom.
