Nigerian data and intelligence startup, Stears Business, has
announced the closing of its seed round funding, in which $3.3 million was
raised.
The round which was led by Mac Venture Capital had
participation from other companies including Serena William’s Serena Ventures,
Melo 7 Tech Partners, Omidyar Group’s Luminate Fund, and Cascador.
In a statement released by Stears’ CEO, Preston Ideh, on
Monday, he expressed excitement at the development and assured that the funding
will translate to the expansion of the company to other African countries.
The statement read in part, “We’re excited to announce that
we have closed our seed round funding of $3.3M led by @MaCVentureCap, with
participation from @SerenaVentures.
“Like all startups, it is our job to obsess over the problem
we set out to solve and keep learning from our users. We know that the market
wants more than just articles, no matter how well-researched. It isn’t just
about building Stears 2.0 in the 54 African countries; that is not the goal.
“To be the most trusted source of data and insights in
Africa, a >$1 trillion economy with >1 billion people, the continent
needs deep, reliable, regular streams of data, not just articles or reports. To
provide this, we know what we must do next: focus on making proprietary data,
models, tools and forecasts directly available to our users.
“What does this look
like? It means building the most valuable database on African economies and
markets. It means expanding our intelligence team into Kenya, South Africa, and
Egypt. It means developing local expertise that cannot be replicated with
remote offices.”
In an emailed statement by Serena Williams the Tennis champion
stated that she did not invest in the company because of her love for Africa,
but rather, “because Stears has strategically thought of how to increase the
investment community on the continent.”
“They’re aware of the complexities and have leverage with
data and technology, and I truly respect what they’re doing,” she continued.
The financing round places Stears’ total cumulative funding
at $4 million, after an initial pre-seed round of $650,000 in 2019, Bloomberg
reported on Tuesday.
Launched in 2017, Stears was founded by four school mates,
Michael Famoroti, an economist; Bode Ogunlana, a software engineer; Abdul
Abdulrahim, a data scientist; and Preston Ideh, a corporate lawyer, who met
during secondary school at Loyola Jesuit College, Nigeria, and at the London
School of Economics and Imperial College in the United Kingdom.
One of the company’s famous exploit is creating Nigeria’s first real-time election tracker, which drew two million unique users during the 2019 general election cycle.
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