Ugandan startups have increasingly become attractive to VC firms across Africa. Outside the big four of Kenya, South Africa, Nigeria and Egypt, Uganda regularly hovers next to them competing with other startup ecosystems like Ghana, Senegal, Tunisia, Morocco and Rwanda for the best of the rest. Today, we will rank the biggest funding rounds ever raised by Ugandan startups from 2019-2024.
For starters, let’s break down what an investment round is. Throughout their lifetime, startups raise funding to meet their growth and scaling targets. A single startup can raise multiple funding rounds over time. Startup funding rounds usually start with an angel round, then a seed round and finally growth stage rounds like Series A and above.
We will turn to data from Africa: The Big Deal to rank the biggest funding rounds ever raised by Ugandan startups. Africa: The Big Deal is a database of funding rounds raised by African startups. Collecting this data started in 2019 when only $1m deals were covered. In 2020, coverage was extended to $500k+ deals while deals from $100k have been covered in 2021, 2022, 2023 and 2024.
For a startup to be covered on this list, it has to be operating in Africa with its HQ in Africa or with its HQ outside Africa but with founders from Africa, have been captured. This database captures publicly disclosed deals or deals openly shared by the investors or the founders themselves.
The first Ugandan deal recorded in this database was SolarNow’s $9m debt round in January 2019, while the latest round was eMaisha Pay’s undisclosed venture round in February 2024. The biggest funding round raised by a Ugandan startup is Asaak’s $30m Series A while the 10th is Tugende’s $6.3m debt round raised in October 2020.
In total, the 10 biggest funding rounds raised by Ugandan startups were worth $130.8m or an average of $13.08m per deal. The 10 funding rounds were raised by just six startups with Tugende appearing four times, while Watu Credit Uganda appeared twice. These are the biggest funding rounds ever raised by Ugandan startups.
1.Asaak ($30m, January 2022).
The biggest-ever funding round by a Ugandan startup belongs to Asaak. The startup secured $30 million in January 2022 in pre-Series A equity and debt funding from new and existing investors.
Investors included Resolute Ventures, Social Capital, HOF Capital, Founders Factory Africa, End Poverty Make Trillions, Decentralised VC, and several angel investors. The startup, founded in 2016, offers asset financing, particularly for motorcycles, to operators in the informal sector who are often excluded from traditional banking services.
Asaak was co-founded by Kaivan Sattar, Anthony Leontiev, Edward Egwalu, and Dylan Terrill. The founding team brings a diverse range of backgrounds and a passion for fintech, with the mission of unlocking the economic potential of marginalised small and medium business owners. Asaak’s leadership team includes Sattar as CEO and founder, Leontiev as CTO, Terrill as Chief Business Officer, and Egwalu as COO.
The startup, at the time, had financed the purchase of over 5,000 motorcycles and had also started providing smartphone and fuel financing to its customers. Asaak operated in six cities across Uganda and had driven a total of 142 million kilometres with its financed vehicles, accumulating over 2.7 million ride-hailing and e-logistics hours.
The funding was to support Asaak’s expansion into six new African markets and its partnership with Standard Bank to offer financial services to millions of informal workers across the continent. In 2023, Asaak expanded to Latin America through the acquisition of Flex Club, a Mexican startup that provides vehicle financing.
2. Tugende ($17m, December 2021).
This is the first of the four funding rounds raised by Tugende on this list. In December 2021, it closed $17 million in new debt capital. The funding round saw participation from several investors, including a $5 million local currency facility for Uganda from the Nordic Microfinance Initiative (NMI), $6 million from existing lender Symbiotics, and $1 million from the crowdfunding platform Lendahand.
Additionally, Tugende received $5 million from the innovative lending platform Goldfinch to support its operations in Kenya, where it already had 5 branches. This capital was to help Tugende meet the intense customer demand and waiting lists, as well as drive further technology-driven innovation to serve its clients beyond just asset financing.
Founded in 2012, Tugende is a for-profit social enterprise that uses asset finance, technology, and a high-touch customer support model to help micro, small, and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) own income-generating assets.
The startup’s core product is a lease-to-own package for motorcycle taxi (boda boda) drivers in Uganda and Kenya, which includes training, insurance, safety equipment, and hands-on support.
By that funding round, Tugende had served over 54,000 clients, with more than 23,000 already achieving full ownership of at least one asset.
3. Watu ($15m, February 2024).
This is the latest funding round that we are featuring on our list. Watu Credit, an Asset FinTech company, raised a $15 million 5-year term facility from Gateway Partners through their Africa Credit Opportunities Fund. This initial tranche was part of a larger initiative to raise $50 million and would support Watu Credit’s mission to enhance financial inclusion in Uganda and across the region.
Established in 2019, Watu Credit specialises in providing loans for mobility and connectivity assets, such as smartphones, two & three-wheelers, electric motorbikes, and cars, with a focus on serving the unbanked and financially underprivileged population just like Asaak and Tugende.
Watu Credit’s unique business model offers affordable financing options to riders, enabling them to achieve financial security and ownership of essential assets like motorcycles, which often serve as their main source of income.
The subordinated debt investment from Gateway Partners would contribute to Watu Credit’s balance sheet growth and facilitate the “crowding-in” of additional senior debt financing. This funding milestone was a testament to the collaborative efforts of Watu Credit and Gateway Partners in driving positive change and fostering financial inclusion in the African continent, offering the underserved and unbanked population a pathway to financial security and empowerment.
4. Tugende ($13m, November 2019).
The second funding round raised by Tugende on our list. It raised $13 million from undisclosed sources, supported by South Africa-based advisor, Verdant Capital. At that point, $2 million had already been disbursed.
Tugende also had 14,000 active leases and a loan book of $13.7 million as of September 2019, a four-fold increase from January 2018. The company’s 30-day portfolio-at-risk ratio remains below 1%, and Verdant Capital described Tugende as “robustly profitable.”
5. Numida ($12.5m, September 2022).
Irene Mwoyogwona: Beyond the Numbers – How Pride Bank's Award-Winning CFO Combines Profitability and Social Impact
Numida was the first Ugandan startup to make it into the famous Y Combinator accelerator program. (It still is the only one so far).
After the accelerator, Numida raised $12.3 million in a pre-Series A equity-debt funding round led by Serena Ventures, with participation from Breega, 4Di Capital, Launch Africa, Soma Capital, and Y Combinator. Existing investor MFS Africa also made a follow-on investment, while Lendable Asset Management extended a $5 million debt facility to the startup.
This funding was to support Numida’s plans to expand its digital lending services beyond Uganda and unlock the potential of micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs) across the continent.
Numida, founded in 2017 by Mina Shahid, Catherine Denis, and Ben Best, focuses on providing affordable and ethical lending to small businesses that are often overlooked by traditional financial institutions. The startup uses its own credit scoring model, which is built on the loan data and business profiles of its customers, to assess creditworthiness.
Unlike many digital lenders, Numida does not scrape data from borrowers’ personal contacts or social media accounts, prioritising transparency and customer privacy. Numida had grown over 7.5 times, issuing $20 million in working capital to micro and small businesses by the time it raised this funding round, and planned to double its active client base to 40,000 within the next 18 months.
With the new funding, Numida aimed to expand into two new African markets, selected from Ghana, Nigeria, Egypt, or Kenya, and continue to improve its risk assessment and product offerings to provide even more affordable unsecured working capital loans to underserved MSMEs.
6. GrainPulse ($11m, December 2019)
Grainpulse, a Ugandan supply chain platform for farmers, raised $11 million from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the Private Sector Window of the Global Agriculture and Food Security Program (GAFSP) in December 2019.
This investment was to enable Grainpulse to strengthen its farmer supply chain, increasing food production and economic growth in Uganda.
Grainpulse, formerly known as Savannah Commodities Company, is a leading agritech startup in Uganda. The company processes and exports coffee, sources and mills grain and cereals from local farmers, and operates the country’s first fertiliser blending plant.
Grainpulse expected that IFC-supported expansion to increase its reach from 36,000 farmers to more than 300,000 by June 2023. The funding also allowed the company to launch an online platform to provide farmers with information on best practices and train agro-input dealers and retailers on financial management skills to help them expand and secure access to finance.
7. Tugende ($10m, June 2022)
Tugende closed a $10 million pre-Series B funding round. The equity investment was led by existing shareholder Partech, with participation from two new investors, including Women’s World Banking Asset Management (WAM). Additionally, Tugende also closed debt financing from Cordaid Investment Management, a European impact investor focused on supporting MSME growth in Africa.
This combined $10 million in equity and debt funding strengthened Tugende’s balance sheet, allowing the company to increase its portfolio growth and address the significant credit demand among MSMEs, particularly after the strict lockdowns of 2020 and 2021.
8. Solar Now ($9m, January 2019)
Uganda-based off-grid solar company SolarNow closed its largest financing facility to date through SunFunder, with Oikocredit and responsAbility contributing to a US$9 million debt funding round.
This was the third structured asset finance instrument arranged for SolarNow by SunFunder, after previous ones in 2016 and 2017, and enabled the company to deploy 17,500 new off-grid solar systems to customers in Uganda, along with a range of appliances. The new systems amounted to around 2.5 MW of newly installed off-grid solar capacity, with an expected impact of more than 70,000 women gaining improved energy access in Uganda.
“This syndication and the SAFI structure allow us to minimise the fundraising burden and to focus on our business instead. By selecting the right clients and treating them well, our credit portfolio remains healthy and we create a strong foundation for sustainable growth,” said SolarNow chief executive officer (CEO) Willem Nolens at that time. SunFunder’s director of investments Surabhi Visser expressed pride in backing SolarNow’s growth, stating, “We have just had our five-year anniversary working with SolarNow, and this takes us to US$19 million in investments that we’ve arranged or made directly in the company.”
9. Watu ($7m, August 2022).
Watu Credit, an asset financing company specialising in motorbike taxis, secured a $7 million investment from Verdant Capital to expand its operations in Uganda. Uganda is Watu Credit’s second largest market after Kenya, where the business was first established in 2015. The investment, drawn from Verdant Capital’s Hybrid Fund, helped Watu Credit to strengthen its balance sheet and expand its footprint of two-wheeler financing throughout Uganda.
By the time Watu Credit raised this funding, it had provided over 370,000 loans across 6 countries, leveraging technology such as automated processes, GPS tracking tools for motorbikes, and digital payments via mobile money wallets.
10. Tugende ($6.3m, October 2020)
Tugende announced the completion of a $6.3 million Series A investment round, led by Toyota Tsusho’s investment fund Mobility 54.
Other participants in this funding round included the U.S.-based Global Partnerships’ Social Venture Fund, current shareholders like Denali Venture Philanthropy and Segal Family Foundation, and new angel investors. Launched in 2012 and based in Kampala, Uganda,
Tugende used the new investment to enhance its technology platform for internal operations and client-facing offerings, including its transparent, dynamic credit score. Tugende also used the capital to grow its core financing product for motorcycle taxi drivers and accelerate diversification into other MSME asset finance products like retail shop equipment, agriculture, and e-mobility.
After this funding, Mobility 54 and its group network supported Tugende with market expansion, partnerships, and technology development.
