Tech News

OneOrder, Egypt’s supply chain solutions provider for restaurants, has raised $3 million seed funding led by Nclude with participation from A15, and Delivery Hero Ventures. The latest funding brings the total funding raised by the startup to $10.5
million, including $6.5 million working capital financing from financial institutions.

Launched in March this year, OneOrder makes it possible for restaurants to order food supplies through its online platform, solving the fragmented supply chain challenges that lead to erratic prices, waste, quality issues, and storage cost.

By using its platform, restaurants no longer have to deal with tens of suppliers, and can order only what they need, for next day delivery, stemming wastage and doing away with the need for warehouses. The platform also ensures operational efficiency and helps restaurants save money by leveraging OneOrder’s economies of scale.

The startup plans to use the funding to scale its operations in Egypt including increasing its warehouse footprint, and to explore growth opportunities within the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region, and Africa.

“We are exploring Saudi Arabia and expanding south into our continent. I think Africa has a lot of markets that feel the same pain points that Egypt does,” said OneOrder co-founder and CEO, Tamer Amer, who co-founded OneOrder with Karim Maurice (CTO), also founder Cube, an online restaurant-reservation service.

“The solution that we’re providing has shown that this industry is ready for tech solutions…[and] we are working on a more substantial operating system for the restaurants not just the supply chain and inventory management system, rather the full cycle that would turn their operations automatic by using AI and machine learning capabilities to drive the supply chain,” said Amer, a restaurateur for over two decades, initially in the U.S before settling in Egypt from 2008.

Amer, told TechCrunch that the sourcing challenges he experienced operating two restaurants in Egypt — Fuego, a sushi bar, and Longhord Texas Barbeque — inspired the launch of OneOrder, to serve the country’s total addressable market of 400,000 restaurants.

“I had always taken the supply chain in the U.S for-granted; we would order and get the supplies all the time. We didn’t have to worry about shortages or price changes. I realized that Egypt is so underserved and the industry is really doing a lot of things that we shouldn’t be doing,” he said.

“… restaurants should not have a full-time job monitoring the supply chain and procuring products because it takes away focus on the core business, which is serving customers. So that’s where the idea really started,” he said.

OneOrder plans to, through its partners and backed by its extensive data, begin extending working capital financing options to restaurants as a way of helping them scale their operations.

Basil Moftah, the managing partner at Nclude, said: “The product-market fit of the OneOrder solution is very impressive, along with the positive impact it is delivering to all stakeholders in the value chain. Through the use of technology and alternative data, OneOrder’s embedded financing will help underserved clients who are unable to secure traditional financing. This aligns perfectly with our investing philosophy and we are glad to be embarking on this journey with the team.”

With $3M new funding, Egyptian startup OneOrder sets out on growth drive by Annie Njanja originally published on TechCrunch

French VC firm Partech has closed another seed fund dedicated to early-stage tech startups — the fund is called Partech Entrepreneur IV. This time, Partech has raised €120 million. It represents $124 million at today’s exchange rate.

In 2020, Partech raised $100 million for Partech Entrepreneur III. At the very end of 2016, Partech raised $107 million for its previous seed fund. So Partech will have a bit more money to invest in early-stage startups, but it won’t be a massive difference.

With today’s new fund, the firm plans to invest anything between €300,000 and €3 million. For many startups, this will represent their first VC investment, at the seed stage and sometimes even pre-seed stage. Partech can lead or co-invest in the round.

When it comes to follow-on rounds, a VC firm that chooses to invest once again in a portfolio company used to be an exception. It has become the norm for many VC funds. And Partech is following this trend as it says that it will be able to reinvest until the Series B round.

But Partech Entrepreneur IV remains a dedicated seed fund because Partech thinks seed investments require a dedicated team with some specific skills. “Backing and working with exceptional founders from the very beginning of their journey is the shared passion — and only focus — of our team. It is, in our experience, a unique craft, requiring stage-specific expertise, commitment and mindset,” General Partner Boris Golden said in a statement.

As for verticals and geographies, Partech doesn’t have any specific industry, market or model in mind. It is an opportunistic seed fund mostly focused on Europe, with some investments in the U.S. and Southeast Asia.

“We are convinced that spotting the future leaders of new emerging categories often requires a broad scope, and a genuine open-mindedness towards what the most talented founders come up with,” General Partner Romain Lavault said in a statement.

While Partech doesn’t list all the limited partners in its new seed fund, the firm says that 150 entrepreneurs (current or past) contributed to the new fund. There are other backers as well, such as financial institutions, multinational corporations and family offices.

In the past, Partech has invested in the seed rounds of Alan, Sorare, Jellysmack, Xendit and Merama. And now, Partech has raised enough money to invest in another 50 tech startups.

Partech raises fourth seed fund by Romain Dillet originally published on TechCrunch

Kapu, a social commerce startup, coming out of stealth today having raised $8 million seed funding, is hoping to help lessen the burden of buying food for Kenyan consumers, many of whom are grappling with the sky-rocketing food prices.

Kapu founder, Sam Chappatte, an ex-Jumia executive, said the startup has since inception in January this year been building a b2c e-commerce service that enables consumers buy groceries at lower prices, through online and offline channels.

The startup is now expanding its network of local agents that consumers can place orders with. It will soon support WhatsApp orders too. By sourcing directly from manufacturers and producers, Kapu enables group bulk-buying of groceries and claims to help consumers save up 30% of the spend on fresh produce and packaged consumer goods.

“People spending like 40 to 50% of their household income on the grocery basket is a big problem for society, but it is also a huge opportunity … The reason we started Kapu is that we think that there is a more relevant model of e-commerce that can be built to target the grocery basket, which is the biggest portion of spend for the vast majority of consumers. And if by using technology we can bring efficiency then we can have a tremendous impact on society for consumers and businesses,” Chappate told TechCrunch.

The seed round was co-led by Giant Ventures and Firstminute Capital, with participation from Founder Collective, Base Capital, Norrsken (Klarna co-founder Niklas Adalberth’s fund) and Raven One. They join Kapu’s early backers, including India’s Meesho and Brazil’s Facily co-founders, and a number of African family offices, Twitter’s Biz Stone, Supercell’s Ilkka Paananen, Tom Blomfield of Monzo and serial entrepreneur Alexander Rittweger.

Sam Endacott, partner at Firstminute capital, said in a statement: “Sam is deeply experienced in both the e-commerce and logistics category and we are thrilled to partner with him and the entire Kapu team to help alleviate the cost of living crisis on the Continent for consumers, unlock social mobility and drive growth for SMEs in the region.”

Kapu says it has 1,500 agent collection centers across Nairobi, and will, in its next phase of growth, work to fully penetrate Kenya’s capital before expanding to new markets.

Kapu’s agents, usually positioned within residential areas, takes customers’ orders, and makes deliveries the next day.

“Customers receive a notification from Kapu and also from the agents, to go pick up their goods. Many agents also deliver to consumers’ homes,” said Chappate.

Kapu said the offline channel (through agents) and online direct to consumer (via WhatsApp) models are designed to suit the Kenyan market, where e-commerce has not taken off but social commerce is showing signs of potential.

Kenya is said to have one of the highest percentages of monthly WhatsApp users in the world, according to Global Web Index’s 2020 Social Media User Trends Report — happening as the popularity of the social commerce sector surges in the region as the shift toward online shopping continues post Covid pandemic.

Kapu joins the growing list of startups that are digitizing the informal retail sector in Kenya, including Tushop, which launched last year. Kapu and Tushop are both enabling group buying of food supplies through agents and WhatsApp.

Social commerce startup Kapu, by ex-Jumia executive, comes out of stealth with $8M funding by Annie Njanja originally published on TechCrunch

After four years operating primarily as a logistics marketplace, Egypt’s Voo has rebranded to SideUp and transformed its strategy to offer a complete spectrum of e-commerce support services, including payment gateways, API integration for shipping, warehousing, fulfillment, and advisory.

The startup has also expanded to Saudi Arabia, where it will be headquartered henceforth, after raising $1.2 million seed funding. This latest round had the participation of Launch Africa VC, 500 Global, Riyadh Angels, Alex Angels, Al Tuwaijri Fund and Saudi angel investor Faisal AlAbdulsalam.

SideUp founder and CEO Waleed Rashed told TechCrunch he was inspired to link small merchants to e-commerce support, after realizing they were ignored by large service providers.

“There is a lot of talk about how e-commerce is scaling, but still, we are not empowering enough of those (micro, small and medium enterprises) that are selling online. Merchants need many services and a complete ecosystem to be successful,” said Rashed.

“This is why I decided to empower small and medium businesses; SideUp is for the merchants in the village, or those selling products over Instagram, Facebook or WhatsApp. They get accessibility to all the services starting from the courier company, warehousing and fulfillment, to marketing services,” he said

Rashed first ventured into entrepreneurship in 2012, after a career in banking, when he founded Ingez an errands company that gave him first-hand experience in running an e-commerce business.

“Through the four years I understood a lot of things about logistics, operations, and ecommerce. I saw how small businesses, because they lacked volume, were not a priority for big logistics companies,” said Rashed, who after Exiting Ingez, founded SideUp to tackle challenges faced by small businesses and to help them scale.

Growth

SideUp’s partner service providers enable merchants to sell in 45 countries, which Rashed said, has opened up new markets, which had previously been inaccessible by small enterprises.

SideUp currently serves 2,000 e-commerce businesses, which can also access cash collection service and credit to expand their businesses. Its portfolio has grown 30% month-on-month, achieving over $500,000 Gross Merchandise Volume per month.

Riyadh Angels co-founder, Dr. Khalid Al Tawil, said: “Ecommerce remains fragmented across most of the region, creating a number of challenges for business owners. SideUp’s platform is a giant leap forward giving them a single place to access partners and technology to grow their businesses exponentially. We are excited to see them come to Saudi Arabia and support businesses through their next phase of growth.”

The startup now plans to grow its clientele base by scaling in Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and expanding to at least two other countries before the end of 2023, to tap the burgeoning e-commerce sector in different regions.

The Middle-East and Africa e-commerce markets are set to grow above 11.5% in the next five years sustained by internet and smartphone penetration, urbanization and mobile shopping, and as more businesses embrace e-commerce, according to a Mordor Intelligence report.

Egypt’s SideUp raises $1.2M to grow its e-commerce support platform by Annie Njanja originally published on TechCrunch