Gebeya Inc, an edtech and online marketplace company based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, has raised $2 million in a seed funding round co-led by Partech and Orange Digital Ventures with participation from Consonance Investment Managers, the company has announced recently in a post on LinkedIn.
Founded in 2016 by Amadou Daffe and Hiruy Amanuel, Gebeya focuses on cultivating untapped tech potential of the African youth through its training program to prepare them for the demands of the global market. It aims to become an active contributor to Africa’s digital transformation and build a booming Africa for Africans through continental and global job opportunities. The company is committed to building the next-generation workforce pipeline for a 21st-century African digital economy. Gebeya has so far graduated over 600 tech talents, more than a third of whom have been matched with startups across Africa and the world.
Commenting on the investment, Amadou Daffe, Co-founder and CEO of Gebeya, said,
“This investment, made possible by global investment firms dedicated to Africa’s technological advancements, marks a pivotal movement for Gebeya. The company has been strongly committed to bringing the abundant capacity of Africa’s youth to light. This investment will enable us to further strengthen the community of top-notch tech talents and position Gebeya as the go-to for other companies as well as startups. Through this investment, Gebeya will be at the forefront of the digitization and utilization of Africa’s potential.”
The company plans to use the latest investment to scale up its training and marketplace services in Francophone Africa as well as launch its online African talent marketplace. Gebeya said the platform will provide substantial transparency for clients in choosing ideal talents best suited for their projects.
Tidjane Deme, General Partner at Partech Africa, said,
“At Partech Africa, we’ve been watching this space closely and we believe there is a large opportunity to address unmet demand and create value for the growing pool of African talent on the global stage. With Gebeya’s model and the team’s dedication to this challenge and the amazing progress they’ve made so far, we are really excited to join them in the next stage.”
Last year, the International Finance Corporation (IFC) granted $500,000 to Gebeya to provide scholarships to aspiring female software engineers. The company said, through the Digital Gender Ethiopia Program it will train a total of 250 aspiring female software engineers in Back-End/Front-End Engineering, Business Analysis, DevOps, Mobile Application and UX/UI Engineering.
Marrieme Diop of Orange Digital Ventures Africa also commented on the investment saying,
“With more than 60% of VC backed tech startups in Africa created in the last 5 years, our ecosystem is growing very fast and investments are booming, yet the talent gap remains wider. Skills shortage is a critical barrier to startups successfully exploiting the power of new technologies. At ODV Africa, we are happy to support the hardworking Gebeya team and strongly believe in their ability to build the appropriate and sustainable pipeline of really talented African engineers to meet future skills needs on a global scale.”
Expressing gratitude to the investors, Hiruy Amanuel, Angel investor and Co-founder of Gebeya, said, “We are truly excited to be working with such a great group of investors. They have been very supportive of our initiatives through the years and naturally, the relationship has matured into early-stage funding.”
The word Gebeya means “market” in the national Ethiopian language Amharic. Aligned with its nameshake, Gebeya provides a new type of employee market, linking highly trained tech professionals with the employers who seek them.
