Village Capital has Partnered with Paypal to bring you the 2018 Fintech Africa, a collaboration that is seeking for startups in Kenya, Nigeria, South Africa, Ghana, Uganda, Rwanda, and Tanzania that:
- Address financial health concerns including insurtech, pensions and savings, cooperative finance, and financial literacy;
- Leverage data for alternative means of credit scoring, identity verification and protection, and consumer insights;
- Integrate financial health services with other mobile services including social media, gaming, and online commerce;
- Apply fintech solutions to drive innovation and business model improvement in our other sectors of interest: agriculture, energy, education, and health.
The three months training program for early-stage startups is et to see the top 2 startups selected by their peers get an investment fund of USD$50,000. Village Capital has run programs for groups of early-stage entrepreneurs that are working on a particular problem (i.e. financial health, sustainable agriculture) Each program concludes with our Fund investing in the top two companies. Since 2012 it has run seven programs and made 13 investments in sub-Saharan Africa, including:
- PayGo Energy, which sells clean cooking fuel on a pay-as-you-go basis. T$1.43M Series Seed debt and equity financing led by Novastar Ventures.
- PiggyBankNG, which helps debit card holders save – the platform allows users to withdraw money for free on certain dates, incentivizing savings and eliminating the temptation to withdraw
- ARED, which leases a solar-powered mobile kiosk that charges cell phones. The company franchisees have the opportunity to run local kiosks for free.
Applications were open on Wednesday, October 24, 2017, and will close on Friday, November 24, 2017.
