Kene Okafor, a serial entrepreneur, founded a tech company called Chipper Africa Series Ftx in 2009. She currently serves as Chief Marketing Officer for Techcrunch, a leading tech news site. During her time with Techcrunch, she helped to launch a number of other startups and has been recognized for her achievements. She was recently named one of Forbes’ Women to Watch and has a long list of other accomplishments.
Career path
It’s a good time to be a venture capitalist in Africa. This is due to the fact that investors have been betting big on the startup community in the region. While the African markets are largely in their infancy, the tech startups and crypto startups in the region are showing great signs of growth.
One of the biggest startups in Africa, Chipper Cash, recently raised a second round of funding, bringing its total to $250 million. This is an extension of the company’s Series C round, which saw SVB Capital and Ribbit Capital lead the investment. However, it wasn’t long after that the company received news of layoffs. According to sources, more than 50 people were laid off in multiple departments odisha discom.
Impact on the world
The crypto and fintech startup Chipper Cash continues to make headlines for its no-fee cross-border payment service that caters to Africans. The company, founded by Ham Serunjogi and Maijid Moujaled, is valued at about $2 billion. After raising a $100 million Series C round in May, it secured an additional $150 million in an extension round led by FTX, Sam Bankman-Fried’s now defunct cryptocurrency exchange platform.
Aside from FTX, Deciens Capital and Ribbit Capital also participated in the Series C extension round. Chipper Cash has already conducted crypto tests in South Africa and Uganda. Moreover, its platform is used by more than five million customers in Africa.
Last month, the company announced its acquisition of Zambian fintech company Zoona. In addition, the company has partnered with DriveWealth to offer stocks to Uganda.
Funding
It’s been a great year for startups in Africa, as they’ve raised a total of over $300 million in financing. The number of companies raising back-to-back equity rounds is on the rise. In fact, there are now four companies in the continent that have raised a $100 million round, and the trend continues to grow.
One of the more promising players is OZE, which provides embedded finance products to small businesses. This includes digital recordkeeping tools and payment systems. They’ve already raised $3 million in a pre-Series A round.
Another startup that’s been making waves is OVEX, a South African digital asset exchange. They’ve also secured an equity investment of $122 million from FTX, a former cryptocurrency exchange platform owned by Sam Bankman-Fried.
Other ventures
Chipper Cash is a company based in Africa that partnered with DriveWealth to offer stock trading to Uganda. The partnership is a good indication that major players are finally starting to get serious about crypto. They’ve already tapped SVB Capital, a corporate venture capital arm of SVB Financial Group, to invest in the company.
There’s more to the company than just trading stocks though. For instance, Chipper Cash has raised over $305 million in total since its inception. As part of the deal, FTX will provide its users with the option to pay with Chipper Cash. In addition, the company has a slew of other offerings, including a decentralized wallet and an augmented reality app.
Another example is OVEX, a South African digital asset exchange. A major advantage of OVEX is that it is able to offer its users OTC trading.
