Nigerian start-up, Edves, which has developed a portal for schools to share educational materials with learners and for parents to make payments to schools, among the winners at the just concluded 2017 Seedstars World startup competition led by Ghanaian startup AgroCenta, which beat all competitors in Lausanne, Switzerland.
The agri-tech startup walks away with US$500,000 in investment from Seedstars World.
Startups from the African continent dominated the competition as four of the five main awards were won by African startups.
And the ultimate @Seedstars Global Winner is @agrocenta from Ghana! Congratulations to every single startup that participated! pic.twitter.com/Aemtsp3c8G
— Seedstars (@Seedstars) April 12, 2018
Agrocenta is an innovative online platform that empowers small holder farmers and farmer based organizations in rural farming communities to access a wider online market outside their immediate locality to trade fairly and equitably.
Farmers can also access technological tools and information that will inform them on best farming practices such weather information, market information and finally access to agro inputs such as fertilizers, pesticides and weedicides directly from stakeholders.
The winners of the other four prizes were:
BBVA open talent prize: FinChat (Singapore) which makes messaging services compliant with data retention regulations, so that bankers can reach out to the billions of users of these messaging platforms.
Enel Africa Energy prize: SolarFreeze (Kenya) is pioneering mobile cold-storage units powered by renewable energy to help rural smallholder African farmers to face the huge challenge of post-harvest loss.
Transforming education prize: Edves (Nigeria) which has developed a portal for schools to share educational materials with learners and for parents to make payments to schools.
Merck health tech prize: EMGuidance (South Africa) which aggregates medical content from regional experts for medical professionals in one app and platform.
Speaking to participants at the summit, Alisée de Tonnac, Seedstars co-founder, and CEO pointed to the importance of accelerators in emerging markets in helping startups to raise funding.
Since the inception of Seedstars World in 2013, the organisation has supported 1500 entrepreneurs, which have been assisted to create over 2000 jobs, generate $70-million a year in revenue and raise $92-million in funding.
