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Women-led Bahati Books wins second edition of Africa Tech Pitch LDN

by Innov8tiv.com
Women-led Bahati Books wins second edition of Africa Tech Pitch LDN

Run by the Africa Technology Business Network (ATBN), Africa Tech Pitch LDN is a pitch event aimed at showcasing high-potential, high-impact technology startups addressing a need in the African market.

Held in London, it provides a global platform for Africa-focused startups to showcase their solutions to an audience of entrepreneurs, investors, technologists and media in order to get valuable feedback and build connections to help them move their ideas forward.

The first edition held in April featured Africa-focused startups from the UK, Rwanda, US and France. The winners of the audience favourite vote SafeMotos, recently announced they had raised $131K in funding to further develop their solution.

The second edition on 12th November featured startups that had been supported by ATBN through their startup support programme i4Dafrica.

“We set up i4DAfrica to support Africa-focused startups in the UK because we believe they present a unique opportunity. They have the ability to leverage the vast resources available to them in the UK startup ecosystem to develop solutions that positively impact Africa. Ultimately we want to be a bridge that enables exchange and collaboration between the UK and Africa tech ecosystems,” Eunice Baguma Ball, founder ATBN

Five startups pitched on the night including:

 IZIFIN, a mobile banking and credit rating solution to enable access to financial services for the unbanked in Sub-Saharan Africa.

estimate.ng, a platform empowering local skilled trademen and women in Nigeria’s construction industry by connecting them to clients and providing training.

MedTechDoctors, a network for doctors and medical technologists who are pushing the boundaries of medical technology innovation to impact healthcare in Africa, with their first product in development being a skin cancer detection mobile application.

 OKIKI, a movie streaming app with a social twist that is fighting the piracy scourge bleeding the African film industry while providing a unique experience for film fans by connecting them to their favourite actors and to each other.

Overall, the quality of all the pitches was very high but at the end of the day it was women-led Bahati Books, an e-publishing platform for undiscovered African writing talent who impressed that much more, winning both the audience favourite and judges’ vote.

Founders Barbara Njau and Kudakwashe Kamupira, gave an impassioned pitch drawing from their own experiences as book lovers looking for good African stories to read and finding mostly the all too well known African narrative of poverty, war and disease.

We are ecstatic to have won the competition and chosen as the strongest start-up concept – it’s such a positive affirmation for us! We also had a lot of food for thought based on the panellist’s feedback – and this is all part of our growth journey.” Barbara Njau, co-founder Bahati Books.

Visit Africa Tech Pitch LDN’s storify page for an overview of the event in tweets and pictures.

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