Afridigest Week in Review: The first announced deal of 2023

+In The Hot Seat with Oui Capital's Peter Oriaifo +Mega-rounds of 2022 +The new Afridigest Fintech Transactions Database +What's your '23 unicorn prediction? +Where in Africa have you been? +More

Emeka Ajene

Jan 9

The Afridigest Week in Review is a must-read weekly recap for Africa-focused founders, executives, and investors.

Welcome back, friends! The most clicked link from last week was Rick Zullo’s 'Niche is the next big thing.' We didn’t send the Fintech Review as there were no fintech deals in Week 1, but we sent this earlier today. (But on second thought, we'll still send the Fintech Review out — deals or no deals — tomorrow.)

📌 This is the first Week in Review covering 2023. New Year, New Us: 1) You’ll find a new 'Hot Seat' `🔥🪑` content format below, 2) we launched a new Fintech Transactions Database earlier today — you can find it here, and 3) the 'Last Word' section is back for the first time in a long time. Also, I published a new piece in my LinkedIn newsletter, Lessons for Business Leaders. `That said, thanks to everyone who reached out and/or filled out the feedback form last week! I hear you loud & clear 🙏🏽`

✨ Help us improve for you this year by sharing your thoughts via this simple anonymous feedback form.

If you’re new, welcome 🙌🏽 — you're among thousands of readers who receive this Week in Review on Mondays, the Fintech Review on Sundays generally, and (for those who've opted in) the French-language Revue de la Semaine on Wednesdays (which is on a temporary hiatus right now). And from time to time, an original essay/article goes out on Saturdays. For past essays and digests, visit the archive.

[We often link to older editions of this newsletter, but if you’re not a paying subscriber, you won't have access to the historical archive. Remember to upgrade your subscription or start a trial for full access.]

Week 1 2023: January 1-7

🔦 Deals

FUNDRAISES ACROSS THE CONTINENT

🇳🇬 Pakam, a Nigerian waste collection & reporting software platform, announced a $635K pre-seed raised from undisclosed investors.
🇪🇹 Teraki, an Ethiopian audio streaming platform that hosts East African audiobooks, podcasts, and radio shows, raised an undisclosed amount from Renew Capital. (Trivia: Because Pakam’s pre-seed was announced on Dec 31st strictly speaking, Teraki wins the first announced deal of 2023. 🥇)

INVESTOR ACTIVITY

Plesion Capital, an American social impact venture capital firm with a particular focus on Africa, formally launched. It also announced that it participated in the previously disclosed seed round of Ugandan goal-based savings & investment platform XENO with a $500K investment.
The Moroccan National Fund for Innovation and Entrepreneurship’s vehicle, Maroc Numeric Fund II, is now open to Moroccan startups outside of Morocco. Startups must have one founder of Moroccan nationality and a subsidiary in Morocco.

Afridigest is a reader-supported guide to Africa’s startup ecosystem. Both free and paid subscriptions are available. If you’re reading this and want to support us, the best way is by taking out a paid subscription.

🔥🪑 In the hot seat with Oui Capital's Peter Oriaifo

📚 Quick hits

FOR YOUR READING PLEASURE

I told my sister about ChatGPT on Dec 2nd & she finally got around to trying it out last week on Jan 5th — a testament to how much my opinion is valued 😒. But with OpenAI reportedly in talks that see it valued at ~$30B, Generative AI is the theme of the week.

Everything everywhere all at once: The explosion in generative AI — Index Ventures’ Rex Woodbury unpacks what’s happening in generative AI as we enter 2023
The rise, and fall, and rise of conversational AI — Radical Ventures’ Molly Welch on the history of the chatbot and the new golden age of conversational technology we're entering
A new area of A.I. booms, even amid the tech gloom — The New York Times with a good overview of what’s happening: “No area has created more excitement than generative artificial intelligence”

PUBLIC BOOKMARKING

The 30 best pieces of advice for entrepreneurs in 2022 — First Round Review’s roundup of the 30 best pieces of advice they published last year.
How long tech exits actually take — A look at how long it took 224 publicly traded tech companies to exit.

👀 Visual of the Week

Here are the seven $100M+ Africa Tech mega-rounds of 2022 that had an equity component:

(P.S. Our LinkedIn followers saw this first.)

Follow Afridigest on LinkedIn

🔥🪑 Back in the hot seat with Peter Oriaifo

Thanks, Peter! Connect with him on LinkedIn and Twitter.

🕵️‍♀️ In case you missed it

NEWS

Spanish digital monetization technology firm Telecoming reached a strategic agreement with MTN to monetize MTN’s sports offerings across 21 African countries.
The Nigerian Minister of Communications and Digital Economy met with SpaceX’s Vice President of Business Operations on behalf of Elon Musk.

PROFILES/INTERVIEWS

Ifedamola Adefisoye, co-founder and CTO of Nigerian healthtech Chekker
Uzoma Ayogu, co-founder and CTO of Nigerian agtech Releaf (video)
Zachariah George, managing partner at Launch Africa Ventures
Panel discussion (video) on the Nigerian tech ecosystem’s parallels and differences with the Egyptian tech scene, featuring Aly El Shalakany, CEO of Acasia (formerly Cairo Angels Syndicate Fund), Biola Alabi; CEO of Biola Alabi Media, Ibrahim Sagna; Global Head, Advisory & Capital Markets at Afreximbank; and Tarek Shahin, Chief Investment Officer of Asset Management at Misr Capital.

🐤 Tweet of the Week

🎯 This is spot on and would have been the tweet of the week, but self-promotion must happen sometimes. So, how many cities have you been to, dear reader?

Afridigest 🧠💡🌍🚀📨 @AfridigestHQ

How many of these cities have you been to?

Follow AfridigestHQ on Twitter

🗣️ Community Corner and Opportunities (feel free to send yours in)

💼 Google is hiring a Lagos-based Director, Large Customer Sales, West Africa
📈 500 Global is hiring a Partner in either Lagos or Nairobi
🦄 After zero new unicorns last year, it’s time to make your unicorn prediction for 2023:

🙊 The last word

WHAT I’M THINKING ABOUT

It’s been a while since I put this section in the newsletter, but here it is. Historically, I’d share thoughts & recommendations — like this from Week 38 2020. So let’s do that again.

One tool I’m excited to explore this year is Glasp.

I’d been looking for something like it for a while — you can highlight text visually on webpages and your highlights (along with optional notes you add) are automagically saved (& easily exportable). Oh, and they’re also made public. I’ve long had a section called ‘public bookmarking’ in this newsletter and this is the tool for it.

You can see an example and follow along with my public bookmarks here. (And if you end up trying it out, let me know so I can follow your Glasp profile.) This isn’t a paid endorsement by the way :)

Tell me what you thought of today’s newsletter & the new content formats:

😡 Hated it • 😑 Meh • 😃 Loved it

FIN

Thanks for reading Afridigest 🙌🏽 Kindly share this newsletter with friends, colleagues, and Africa Tech enthusiasts in your network. 🙏🏽 And, as always, I’m not hard to reach: email me, or send me a message on Whatsapp, Twitter, or LinkedIn 🙏🏽

Afridigest