Kenyan-Finnish startup, Fuzu raises US$1.85 million to expand across Africa

Fuzu, a Kenyan-Finnish online coaching and recruitment platform, has raised US$1.85 million from multiple investors to expand across Africa and into Asia.

Launched in 2013 by an experienced team of Africa and emerging markets specialists, Fuzu aims to solve the challenges faced by millions of job seekers and employers across the emerging markets.

Fuzu, a Swahili word for ‘self-made success’, is an intelligent career development, learning and recruitment platform.

For employers, the platform offers advanced search and recruitment solutions with competence evaluation and algorithm based ranking to identify the best fitting candidates.

For job seekers, the platform provides career counselling, learning solutions and information about open positions and industry updates, providing support and guidance at different stages of user’s career.

Fuzu launched in Kenya last year, aiming to become the number one choice for job seekers and employers. It currently has roughly 180,000 users and hundreds of companies that use the platform for finding talents.

This fresh funds will be used to further expand its operations in Kenya and across Africa, and into Asia.

”If there is significant friction between supply and demand in the job markets, large amount of jobs fail to materialize and people are left unemployed. Fuzu eases this friction in places where poorly functioning job markets are a hindrance to development,”said Jaakko Kangasniemi, Finnfund CEO.

He added, “…in Kenya youth unemployment is a significant challenge. Fuzu provides job seekers with a possibility to demonstrate their skills and competencies and to find work that suits them.”

Joining Finnfund (Finnish Fund for Industrial Cooperation Ltd.) in the funding round is Barona Technologies Oy and Polkuni Oy, both based in Finland.

”We are truly excited about the confidence and courage demonstrated by Finnfund, Barona and Polkuni in investing in transformation of the job markets, thus improving the opportunities of millions of people in finding their place in the world,” said Jussi Hinkkanen, CEO of Fuzu Ltd.