US and Africa-based blockchain payments startup, Bitmama has announced that it has raised an additional $1.65 million pre-seed fund, ten months after its initial pre-seed round of $350,000. This brings its total pre-seed round to $2 million.
The round was led by Unicorn Growth Capital and Launch Africa Ventures, with participation from Adaverse and follow-on from Flori Ventures, which led its earlier pre-seed round.
New investors in the round include Tekedia Capital, GreenHouse Capital, ODBA, Five35 Ventures, Chrysalis Capital, Enrich Africa, Thrive Africa, Angellist Ventures, and angel investors including, CELO founders; Rene Reinsberg, and Marek Olszewski, and Honey Ogundeyi.
According to its statement, the new fund will be used to expand the company’s operational presence, strengthen its team across different markets, consolidate its product offerings, and plot market penetration across Africa, while rapidly scaling new use cases for cryptocurrency within the continent.
The seed funding will also be used to consolidate the footprint of it virtual domiciliary accounts product, Changera.
Read also: Bitmama launches first African physical crypto cards for in-store payments
Commenting on the raise, Ruth Iselema, Founder and CEO expressed satisfaction with the strides made by the team over the years. She also thanked its partners and investors for contributing to the market dynamics. dynamics.
Bitmama has made a number of strides in the past year. We’ve rolled out two products, both of which are fast closing in on 100,000 users across the African market and recording impressive daily active users across our range of product offerings despite the market dynamics.
Ruth Iselema, Founder and CEO of Bitmama Inc.
“We are building Africa’s most user-friendly, innovative blockchain company, and we are glad to have the backing of seasoned investors and partners who have walked similar turfs. We are privileged to learn from their blended experiences across corporate and blockchain business verticals. We are confident of the results we’ve achieved so far and we are set to build the next big solution that the market deserves”, she added.
At present, the company’s major products are the Bitmama exchange, which allows users to access virtual assets and explore several cryptocurrency use cases and Changera, a social payment solution that allows non-crypto-savvy customers to use their money without limits, from anywhere in the world.
Also speaking on the raise, Janade Du Plessis, Managing General Partner at Launch Africa said “As a prominent Pan-African VC fund, we see our partnership with Bitmama as a way to truly allow all Africans with the ability to trade and manage cryptocurrencies, and digital assets conveniently and universally, creating a significant impact on allowing more people to trade and transact across Africa.
“This is something that we specifically value in our Fund and what Bitmama in particular delivers.”
Hema Vallabh, Founding Partner at Five35 Ventures said:
“Being a leading female-focused VC fund, we at Five35 Ventures look forward to helping Ruth and her dynamic team scale Bitmama, especially seeing the growth of Changera, the remittance platform that allows all Africans to transact internationally at much cheaper rates than established remittance companies in the market.”
A brief about Bitmama
Currently in three African markets; Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya, Bitmama enable users to be able to buy and sell cryptocurrencies conveniently using their debit cards. It also allows them to carry out regular online payments, pay utilities and perform transactions such as staking to hedge against currency devaluation.
Its virtual card offering allows gives users up to $10,000 in monthly spending limits. Powered by VISA, these cards are funded with stablecoins and can work anywhere in the world for online transactions.
With a secured blockchain payment platform, the team believes they are pioneering “Crypto Beyond Trading” for Africans globally. They approach the African crypto market differently by deepening crypto awareness and enabling adoption through innovative product offerings.
With a distributed remote team across Ghana, Nigeria, and Kenya, the team’s goal, according to Ruth, is to leverage the blockchain in building solutions to power seamless peer-to-peer payments across the continent.
Read also: Bitmama announces Credits Programme to help digital natives transition into the blockchain ecosystem
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