Kenyan-Based 88mph Eyes More Funds As It Rebrands

Nairobi-based Incubation hub 88mph, with operation in Cape Town, South Africa and Lagos, Nigeria, said it plans to increase its investable funds by 50 percent to $6.4 million by the end this year and triple that up to $20 million by the year 2016.  The accelerator, which CIO East Africa says also plans to change its name to ‘Nairobi Startup Garage’ in June, has fundraised over $4.3 million so far, for 35 startups across the three countries, with $2.3 million of the amount invested in 19 Kenyan statups, now plans to add another $2.1 million in 2014.

88mph was founded by Kresten Buch, its current managing director, and started operating in Kenya in 2011 before expanding in South Africa and Nigeria, the continent’s largest economies, in subsequent years.  The garage is the muscle behind a number of successful startups including popular Kenyan entertainment website Ghafla, football news website Futaa, online music store Mdundo, online boutique Closet 49 among others.

With a bigger war chest the accelerator plans to increase its foot print across Africa by taking on more startups in other countries.  There are a number of tech focused hubs across Africa that are  playing a key role in lifting Africa’s technology based startups. These hubs provide broader technology space, business incubation, funding and other resources to entrepreneur in return to a stake in the final product.

Source: AFK Insider