NIGERIA – Rabawa, Africa’s first social and video commerce platform, has announced that it has raised US$163,000 from Aptive Capital, a VC firm in USA that is focused on supporting early stage startups, to help it scale its operations.
RABAWA’s social and video commerce solution offer resellers the opportunity to leverage social media for curating, promoting, and selling products from Manufacturers / Distributors to end-users. Rabawa gives resellers access to a virtual shop and thousands of products from trusted suppliers.
Through the use of social and video commerce, heavily discounted prices, and a streamlined logistics chain, Rabawa provides the lowest prices to online shoppers in the continent.
It gives African housewives, students, youths & aspiring entrepreneurs the opportunity to launch their online businesses quickly and easily with ZERO capital investment or inventory. The platform connects resellers and business owners to top manufacturers and wholesalers across Africa, Asia, USA and UK.
Since the official roll out of Pilot model on 1st April 2021, Rabawa has caught the attention of key players in the local e-retail industry and continues to attract the best of talents to take its business model forward. Over 5,000 resellers and 1,000 suppliers are currently registered on the platform.
“The pace at which Rabawa has grown within one month in Nigeria, we will be able to deploy social and video commerce to other African markets.”
Olayinka Akinkunmi – COO, Rabawa
According to Olayinka Akinkunmi, COO of Rabawa, the company’s pace is too promising to be unnoticed.
“The pace at which Rabawa has grown within one month in Nigeria, we will be able to deploy social and video commerce to other African markets,” she said.
She further noted that in line with the United Nations Millennium Development Goal, Rabawa hopes to empower at least 1 million unemployed or underemployed Africans by the year 2023 with their own businesses.
“At Aptive, we are out to identify talents and business models that work and then we invest. We are very impressed with Rabawa’s deep knowledge of the market and their planned approach to solve the challenges of unemployment, poor product availability, high cost of logistics, access to market issues, and poverty across Africa,” the Managing partner of Aptive Capital, Paul Brandon Gilpin, said.
“Since the fund commenced, Aptive Capital has invested in about 8 Startups with Rabawa being the 7th and biggest ticket size (US$163,000) disbursed so far.”
Aptive Capital’s portfolio investments include startups like OneKiosk, SkyfireDigital, MimiMoney, Emmnoch Farms, Statesman, and Slabdeck who have received between US$10,000 and US$50,000 from the funds.
Although unconfirmed, several business moves now hint at Aptive Capital’s interest in participating in a currently undisclosed round of OneKiosk.
With its new funding round of US$163,000, Rabawa has officially positioned itself to be become a key player in the Africa’s e-commerce space by utilizing social and video commerce to build a sustainable business model that impact Africa socially and economically.
