What are your thoughts on Africa’s high acquisition activity over the first months of the year?
“It’s acquisition season in Africa,” says Caleb Maru, investor and owner of Tech Safari, a weekly tour guide on African Tech activity in the ecosystem.
We have been so focused on venture capital funding and the abysmal Q1 2023 report that not enough attention has been given to the various African acquisitions taking place around the continent.
In a little over two weeks, Smile Identity expanded its African footprints by announcing its acquisition of Appruve, and Nigerian car marketplace, Autocheck Africa, acquired a majority stake in Egyptian automotive, AutoTager.
Other African acquisitions which have been made public since the beginning of the year include:
- A leading, valet service provider in Nigeria, GOTWENTYSIX LIMITED, was acquired by DriveMe Mobility Tech (also in Nigeria, and an online driving school, offering digital driver education and simplifying access to drivers’ licenses and driver recruitment).
- Galactech LLC, an entertainment e-sports start-up operating in the MENA region, was acquired by GBarena (an Egyptian, online e-sports community, and tournaments management platform) in a share swap valued at $15 m.
- IRNet Coop Kenya was acquired by Kenyan FinTech start-up, Kwara (neo bank for credit unions) off the back of a $4 m funding round.
- AI solutions company, InstaDeep Ltd, was bought by BioNTech SE (the company harnessing the power of the immune system to develop novel therapies against cancer & infectious diseases) for $684 m in Africa’s biggest acquisition to date.
- Blockfinex (a cryptocurrency trading exchange) acquired Fluidcoins, an enterprise-grade, crypto payment solution for African businesses.
- Andela acquired Qualified, an assessment platform that certifies top engineering talents, adding 3.6 million engineering talents to Andela’s global community.
- Fin, a South African credit-led neobank, acquired Thuthukani Financial Services, a housing finance provider.
- FairMoney, (another) credit-led neobank in Nigeria, acquired PayForce by FairMoney, a merchant payment provider.
- Bloc, a Banking-as-a-Service start-up, acquired Orchestrate, a payments platform.
- Nigeria’s Autochek Africa, Africa’s 360-degree automotive solution, acquired a majority stake in Egypt’s AutoTager, a digital automotive trading and financing company focused on new and used vehicles.
- And Smile Identity – the best identity verification, user onboarding, and real-time digital KYC solutions in Africa – acquired Appruve, a company that verifies the identities of individuals and businesses across Africa easily.
Source: Tech Safari
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