Kenyan Software Startup Bamba Secures $3.2M Seed Funding

Enterprise software startup Bamba secured $3.2 million in a seed funding round led by 468 Capital with participation from Presight Ventures, Jigsaw VC and angel investors Mato Peric, Leonard Stiegeler, Laurin Hainy and Thomas Stafford.

The startup is based in Nairobi, Kenya and builds mobile-first enterprise software for micro-merchants in Africa. Founded in 2022 by CEO Bastian Gotter, Bamba is currently in stealth mode and plans to use the fresh capital to enhance its app and grow its engineering team. Funds will also be earmarked for expanding its user base across 12 sub-Saharan African countries.

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“We truly believe entrepreneurship is essential to prosperity, so we make running a small business easier by building mobile-first small business software for Africa. This investment allows us to scale the platform, the team and gives us access to insights from our high caliber of investment partners,” Gotter said in a press release emailed to PYMNTS on Wednesday (May 18).

Bamba’s tools enable small merchants to manage their customers, record stocks, receive and make payments, and access cash advances against future cash flow.

Ludwig Ensthaler, partner at 468 Capital, said the company believes there are a lot of investment opportunities in Africa in the enterprise software space focusing on micro and small businesses. These opportunities are “significant and remain largely untapped.”

“We believe that Bamba is well placed with a great product and a solid founder to build a category-defining company,” Ensthaler added.

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“We appreciate entrepreneurs that build novel solutions that push boundaries and are thrilled to support Bamba’s potential impact across the small businesses ecosystem in Africa,” said Fabian Hansen, investor with Presight Ventures.

A recent study on African entrepreneurs showed that the percentage of working-age adult entrepreneurs was higher in Africa than anywhere else in the world, PYMNTS reported.