Investors with interest in the tech-driven sectors of African business are numerous. Among United States-based seed money providers and accelerators, Y Combinator is somewhat the most popular.
Some major developments have come from YC's portfolio of African tech startups—especially in the last 6 to 7 months. In November, Paystack—a Lagos-based fintech startup—was taken over by American payments giant Stripe.
Paystack's USD 200 Mn+ exit was followed by a USD 3 Mn raise by Cowrywise, a wealthtech startup that's also based out of Lagos. These two companies are under the YC wing, accessing seed money and accelerator from the Silicon Valley organization.
The crown on YC's efforts to throw weight behind promising African early-stage ventures is the USD 1 Bn valuation of Flutterwave, another Nigerian fintech startup.
In just 5 years since its inception, the payments infrastructure provider has raised USD 225 Mn in total and attained unicorn status. Flutterwave is also one the few African fintech startups that have been able to bank more than 200 Mn in investor consideration.
As it seems, the spotlight is on Y Combinator. However, the firm—which began investing in Africa just 5 years ago—is not the only active American investors in the African tech startup space.
