$6.2 M Pre-Series A funding raised by Ivory Coast-based e-commerce startup Afrikrea
The e-commerce portal for “all things made of Africa,” Afrikrea, located in the Ivory Coast, has secured a US $6.2 million pre-Series A fundraising round and renamed as “ANKA.”
Afrikrea was started in 2016 as an online platform for selling and buying African-inspired apparel, accessories, arts, and crafts, but last year converted to become an all-in-one SaaS solution that provides a smooth e-commerce service for African micro-retailers.
ANKA (which means “Ours” in Bambara and Djoula) wants to establish an e-commerce infrastructure for its more than 13,000 vendors who offer “all things manufactured in Africa” to a worldwide audience. Afrikrea is still a channel on ANKA.
Through its tailored seller platform, seamless coordination of worldwide payments and shipping for thousands of enterprises in Africa and throughout the world, the platform enables African social commerce, exporters, and dropshippers to save time, energy, and money. It has already completed transactions worth over US $35 million in 174 countries.
Investisseurs & Partenaires led the US $6.2 million pre-Series A financing, which also included participation from Alibaba’s executive vice-chairman Joe Tsai, BESTSELLER Foundation, VestedWorld, Enigmo, Groupe Prunay, and Rising Tide Africa.
Saviu Ventures (which is also participating in the round), LoftyInc Capital Management, Kepple Africa Ventures, Consonance Investment Managers, id4 Ventures, and Thierry Petit are among the current investors. With the extra capital, the company’s total investment so far has reached US $8.1 million.
The fresh funds will be used to expand the mobile infrastructure of ANKA’s e-commerce SaaS as well as engage in product development. The money will also be used to employ additional remote developers and increase talent acquisition across the company’s product, sales, and finance departments.
Investisseurs & Partenaires co-CEO Sebastien Boye expressed his joy at having led ANKA’s investment round.
“We have recorded unprecedented growth since the launch of ANKA last year; since then, our subscribers tripled and volume on the newest services has multiplied by eight just over the last six months,” said Moulaye Taboure, CEO and co-founder of ANKA.
“As our vision and clients’ needs had outgrown the singular purpose of the Afrikrea marketplace, operating under ANKA provides a more holistic description of our mission as a pan-African company. Through the ANKA platform, which integrates every aspect of business, we now serve sellers, not just in fashion, but in what will be a variety of sectors in over 80 percent of the African countries.”
“This company is at the heart of IPAE2’s investment strategy: a talented and ambitious African founders’ team, a significant growth and value creation potential, and a compelling impact thesis. Indeed, ANKA aims to give micro-entrepreneurs in Africa all the tools to access the potentialities of the global eCommerce market. The company has the potential to create a full entrepreneurial ecosystem, around its comprehensive platform. We are very impressed with the growth of ANKA since it launched and are confident in their ability to drive digital and financial inclusion for African entrepreneurs,” he said.
