The Global Startup Awards (GSA) Africa. the largest, independent startup competition in the region, has announced the Western African Regional winners of the 2022/23 competition. The announcement took place at the launch edition of GITEX Africa 2023 in Marrakech,
Morocco, late last week.
The fourteen startups that won this year’s competition are from Nigeria, Ghana, Liberia, Cote d’Ivoire, Gambia, Senegal, and Benin. Nigerian startups topped the list by securing six slots at this year’s competition.
This includes the awards for Best Newcomer (Awabah); Startup of the Year (Salubata); Best Agri-Tech Startup (Crop2Cash); Best Health-Tech Startup (Emergency Response Africa); Best Ed-Tech Startup (Dataleum Limited); and Best Web 3.0 Startup (Xend Finance).
Ghana emerged the country with the second-highest number of winning startups after securing three awards which are Best Incubator / Accelerator Programme (2Scale); Diversity Role Model of the Year (Developers in Vogue); and Ecosystem Hero of the Year (Demasko Farms).
Other startups from the remaining countries secured one title each in this year’s Global Startup Awards Africa competition. This includes startups from Liberia, Cote d’Ivoire, Gambia, Senegal, and Benin, which earned the titles of Founder of the Year (MyWatchman), Best Co-Working Space (Impact Hub Abidjan), Best Commerce-Tech Startup (Taybull Soft Ltd.), Best Green-Tech
Startup (SNTECH-Afrique), and Best Mobility & Logistics-Tech Startup (Zed Motors)
respectively.
Nurturing Africa’s future startups
The Global Startup Award (GSA) Africa serves as the exclusive platform for the Global Impact Investment Group (GIIG) to discover, finance, and nurture Africa’s most groundbreaking startups. A primary objective of GIIG is to identify, fund, and foster African innovations that possess global significance.
Leveraging its unique profit-and-purpose fund, known as the GIIG Africa Fund, the organization strategically invests in transformative technologies that have the potential to catalyze new markets and expedite sustainable development across Africa. There is also the GIIG Africa Foundation that facilitates the collaboration between African innovators and the appropriate expertise and strategies, forging connections with global partners to enable growth on a global scale.
In 2021, the launch of the Global Startup Awards Africa competition drew thousands of entries from startups across the continent. The following year, it received an impressive 7,589 entries spanning 12 categories, showcasing African innovation.
This year, the Global Startup Awards competition witnessed even greater participation, with 8,272 entries from all 54 African states. As a result, 71 regional winners emerged, representing Northern, Southern, Eastern, Western, and Central Africa. Notably, the line-up of regional winners comprised representatives from twenty-three African countries.
It was also focused on solutions in agriculture, climate change, commerce, education, healthcare, and mobility & logistics, with a keen interest in startups building Web 3.0 technologies, sustainable business models, green innovation, and diversity in the workplace.
Reflecting on this year’s African regional Global Startup Awards winners, GSA Africa and GIIG co-founder, Jo Griffiths, said,
“With 199 finalists, Western Africa did not disappoint! Our panel of judges was blown away
by the quality and diversity of solutions that are actively working to solve some of our
greatest challenges. From Benin to Togo, startups like Salubata, Xend Finance, and
SNTECH-Afrique is proof that Africa is the tech continent of the future.”
How it is going
Announcing the Global Startup Awards Africa regional winners at GITEX Africa, GSA Africa and GIIG co-founder, Caitlin Nash said:
“These winners represent the top startups in both their home country and region – and it’s all the more significant that we announce them here in Morocco. This competition is all about building global bridges between our continent’s most exceptional solutions and the people, markets and communities where they can make the most significant impact. In that vein, this event has been the ideal launch pad for these startup’s global ambitions, and we’re excited to help take them to the world.”
In March 2023, two African startups achieved significant recognition as Global Winners during the recent Grand Finale event held in Copenhagen. Amidst fierce competition with over 120 companies from 115 countries, Kubik, a pioneering Ethiopian green-tech startup, was distinguished as the esteemed ‘Startup of the Year’.
Similarly, Emata, an innovative Ugandan fintech company, was hailed as the ‘Best Newcomer’. Now, this year’s competition, first saw entrants compete at a national level before these fourteen victorious startups emerged as the regional winners. These startups will move to the Continental Finals of the GSA Africa competition. In this forthcoming phase, they will contend against their counterparts from Northern, Southern, Eastern, and Central Africa.
The African winner emerging from this stage will then earn the privilege of participating in the GSA Grand Finale. This highly anticipated event offers an unparalleled opportunity for these exceptional startups to exhibit their groundbreaking solutions alongside renowned entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, and ecosystem enablers from across the globe.
Technext Newsletter
Get the best of Africa’s daily tech to your inbox – first thing every morning.
Join the community now!
