Does Kune’s USD 1 Mn Pre-seed Expand Africa’s Foodtech Basket?

In the middle of Kenya’s capital city, folks are putting their backs into erecting a modern mega factory for a startup whose chief vow is to give the African serving of ready-to-eat meals an unconventional facelift. 

In the same vicinity as Uhuru Kenyatta's official residence lies the physical evidence of what a brand new player cooks in the country’s colossal foodtech pot. Kune, the foodtech founded in November 2020 by Robin Reecht, is going to great guns to setup and launch ops. 

“I’m currently at the site where work is going on earnestly. Hopefully, we will complete the factory work soon and launch at the start of September,” Kennedy Kamau, Kune’s Managing Director, said on a mid-afternoon call from Arboreturn Road in the Nairobian centrals.

The mildly audible chatter and noticeable movements in the background of the conversation suggested that the startup’s freshly minted million-dollar jetpack is being put to use.

On June 17th, 2020, Kune Africa raised USD 1 Mn in pre-seed to finance its cloud kitchen and food delivery schemes for the region, starting from Kenya. 

However, more importantly, Kune’s pre-seed set the record for the largest pre-seed for a foodtech—and non-fintech startup—in Sub-Saharan Africa. When it comes to unlocking such sizes of early-stage funding chests in the region, fintechs are often the ventures with the seemingly secret passkey. 

Moreover, Kune's funding round stirred a brief yet major ruckus on Kenyan Twitter, not only for its size but also as a result the founder's now-recalled comments about the country's culinary scene.

Why and how did a less-than-a-year-old firm raise the rarest amount regardless? Per Partech Partners’ 2020 stats, the average seed+ ticket size in Africa has gone from USD 1.19 Mn in 2019 back to pre-2017 levels.