Five Southern African startups have been named winners of the AfricArena Johannesburg Fintech, Deep Tech and Enterprise Summit.
Launched in 2017, AfricArena is a platform dedicated to creating market access and fostering investment opportunities for a growing community of tech founders, angel investors, corporate innovators, and venture capitalists.
Designed with a digital-first mindset, AfricArena operates through a series of high-impact investment deal flow events, tailored interventions, and an open-source platform that champions the principles of open innovation and entrepreneurship.
Hosted in collaboration with AWS Startups and 22 On Sloane, the Johannesburg event brought together global investors, industry leaders, and high-growth startups for a day of pitching, networking, and collaboration.
Sixteen startups showcased their products at the event, with five winners selected by a judging panel. They were:
- Best Deep Tech and AI Startup Award: CureRoot (South Africa);
- Best Fintech Startup Award: eQub (Ethiopia);
- Best SaaS Startup Award: Funti3r (South Africa);
- Best Agnostic Startup Award: Loop (South Africa);
- Most Promising Entrepreneur Award: SB Card (South Africa).
The winners each won eligibility for up to US$25,000 in AWS Activate credits, and automatically advanced to the grand finale at the AfricArena Grand Summit which will take place in December in Cape Town, South Africa.
