Social Commerce Platform Maka Raises USD 2.65 M Pre-Seed Funding

Maka, an African fashion and beauty e-commerce platform, has raised a USD 2.65 M pre-seed round led by Pan-African venture capital firms 4DX Ventures and Janngo Capital. Other investors include Palm Drive Capital, angel investor Jonathan Shipman, founder of EVP and Twitch founding member, and executives from delivery platform Wolt.

Maka as an interactive social commerce platform, which, through live try-on hauls, reviews, and user-generated content from both creators and customers, enables users to discover products tailored to their styles in a scalable way. Maka’s platform claims to identify and solve two fundamental problems: a trust issue in the buying process and the challenge creators face in monetizing their influence. To address the trust element, Maka leverages videos as a means to connect users with trusted creators. In low-trust markets, we have observed that video is a powerful tool for building trust. It effectively conveys information, drives conversion, and establishes rapport between the user, the reviewer, and the buyer.