The AI Media Group has launched The Deal Room, Africa’s first artificial intelligence (AI) driven service that aims to connect AI-based startups with potential investors and venture capitalists.
The AI Media Group has over 1 000 companies, consisting of mainly African startups, scale-ups, and small and medium-sized businesses, on their database to which are introduced to investors. The Group reportedly has the largest trading body in the region, consisting of 4 000 community members.
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The AI Media Group hosts Africa’s largest trade show and business conference, the AI Expo Africa, which focuses on Business to Business (B2B) and Business to Government (B2G) trading, AI, Robotic Process Automation (RPA), and Data Science. The company has also published Africa’s first quarterly magazine called, Synapse, which covers AI, Data Science, and relevant case studies.
The Deal Room was born out of the desire to improve the existing service offered by the AI Media Group.
In an official press release, Nick Bradshaw, CEO of AI Media Group and co-founder of AI Expo Africa, explains the objective of The Deal Room and how it will benefit the community.
“The main idea behind The Deal Room platform is to facilitate rapid matchmaking between an investor and 4IR / AI-focused startups and scale-ups that align with the firm’s stage of growth. It’s often a minefield to find the right investor so we curated a group of like-minded investors that are interested in this space or who have a track record of similar investments to date. This is a long-awaited value add service for our community with no strings attached, no “middleman” and total transparency.”
Launch Investment Partners
The Deal Room’s main priority is to connect 4IR, AI, and smart tech companies with investors, VCs, and organisations who are seeking to support firms in this growing sector.
The Deal Room has attracted six launch investment partners which include, Gregg Barrett, CEO of Cirrus AI, Pieter Boon as the co-founder of Cape AI Ventures, Andrea Bohmert, co-managing partner of Knife Capital, Bakang Komanyane, Ventures principal of E4E Africa, Reshaad Sha, CEO of Britegaze, and Aunnie Patton Power, founder of Intelligent Impact.
Reshaad Sha, CEO of Britegaze, commented on the importance of expansion for African AI-based startups.
“BriteGaze Fund One’s primary purpose is to assist AI businesses to accelerate their growth in South Africa and across the African continent through the provision of growth funding and advisory services to expand into new verticals as well as new geographies.”
The Deal Room platform allows for transparency between startups and investors while identifying new companies that share an interest in 4IR and contribute to the African tech scene. The platform encourages collaboration to accelerate AI capabilities in the African AI ecosystem.
Bradshaw compares The Deal Room platform to a dating site and explains the easy application process.
“The Deal Room’s biggest selling point is there is no complicated paperwork, costs, or loss of equity for companies looking to use the platform. They simply answer a set of confidential questions on the nature of their investment needs, details about their company, products, or services, and the AI Media Group then passes them on to the most appropriate investor(s). Just like internet dating, our goal is to make a perfect match and speed up the process of investment capital flowing into the African 4IR tech sector. We can’t wait to see the results!”
Startups and scale-ups seeking funding for 2021 can register here via The Deal Room online submission process.
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