Last night, Injini - a pan-African edtech incubator announced the startups admitted into its second cohort. This was at an event that took place at Amazon's office in Gardens, Cape Town, South Africa.
The eight startups that made it came from 5 countries and are all at "educational stages" according to Injini.
Each of the companies had an opportunity to pitch for one minute. While a panel on EdTech in Africa featuring local entrepreneurs was also held.
The selected startups are; Learning factory (Zimbabwe), eLimu (Kenya), Nahana Afrika (South Africa), Bluebic (Nigeria), Langbot (Ethiopia) Slatecube (Nigeria), ScholarX (Nigeria) and Lightbulb (South Africa).
As you can tell from the list, startups from Nigeria dominated. A direct contrast to the first cohort portfolio - which also had 8 startups - where South Africa dominated.
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The first cohort startups were; Accelerated, Early Bird (South Africa), M-Shule (Kenya), Mtabe (Tanzania), Syafunda (South Africa), Uthini (South Africa), Yo Books (South Sudan), and Zelda (South Africa).
Injini held an event in Uganda at the beginning of the year at The Innovation Village. This was part of their tours across East Africa to encourage startups to apply. Unfortunately, the turn up was disappointing.
In a separate conversation with Doreen Nabaho, Injin's Head of Data Insights & Analytics, she hinted at the fact that even the quality of applications from Uganda was still lacking. Perhaps that's the reason no Ugandan edtech startup made it to the list.
Founded by Jamie Martin and CiTi, Injini is a South African edtech incubator that has so far run two cohorts. In their first cohort, the incubator says that received applications from 13 countries. An indicator that anyone from across the continent can apply.
Their cohorts last 6 months, thus the second cohort incubation will take place from July to December 2018. Participating startup are required to part with equity depending on what level they are at.
"We take 9% (post-revenue companies) -15% (pre-product companies) equity in the main/parent company," wrote Injini on its website.
They, thus, caution applicants that they should "not accept a place if you don't want to give up 9% equity or only want to do it in a local division."
In return, for the equity, "the companies get the Injini programme and direct funding of $50k."