Three Nigerian startups namely – 54Gene, ScholarX, and WellaHealth – have made the list of 12 African startups shortlisted by Google to take part in the third edition of its Launchpad Accelerator Africa programme.
As part of its commitment to growing emerging businesses in Africa, Google has announced the 12 African startups to take part in the capacity-building and empowerment programme.
The programme, which starts on April 1, 2019, involves startups from six African countries, namely: Egypt, Kenya, Nigeria, Senegal, South Africa and Uganda. Of these 12 startups, six have female co-founders and nine are either AI-enabled or have AI potential.
According to Google’s Head of Startup Success and Services, Launchpad Africa, Fola Olatunji-David, “These companies will join other startups in the Launchpad programme, present and past, that are using technology to create a positive impact on key industries in their region. We look forward to supporting and connecting them with startup ecosystems around the world.”
The 12 startups are 54Gene, ScholarX, and WellaHealth from Nigeria; Kwara, OkHi, Data Integrated Limited and Tambua Health from Kenya; PAPS from Senegal, Instadiet.me from Egypt; Swipe2pay from Uganda; Voyc.ai and Zelda Learning from South Africa.
Each of the startups will receive three months intense mentorship and support from Google, cloud and Firebase Credits, three weeks all-expense-paid training at Launchpad Accelerator Africa (Lagos and Nairobi), access to Google engineers, resources, and mentors, during and after the programme and inclusion in the Launchpad Accelerator Global Community and network of alumni and mentors.
To be accepted into Launchpad Accelerator Africa, applicants must be an early stage technology startup based in Sub-Saharan Africa, targeting the African market, that has already raised seed funding. Google, additionally, considers the problem the startup is trying to solve; how it creates value for users and how it addresses a real challenge for their home city, country or Africa broadly. Furthermore, Google looks at whether the startup will share what they will learn from the programme for the benefit of other startups in their local ecosystem.
