Moove Africa B.V. has secured a $23-million Series-A funding round for its pan-African expansion. Moove is a mobility fintech app that provides revenue-based vehicle financing to mobility entrepreneurs in Africa.
Moove raised a $5.5-million seed round in 2020, plus $40 million in debt financing. This brings its total funding to $68.5 million.
Moove was co-founded by two British-born Nigerian technopreneurs, Ladi Delano and Jide Odunsi, in 2019. The startup is Uber’s exclusive car financing and vehicle supply partner in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The company will target the vast market in Africa, which sports a population of more than 1.2 billion people and an over 50-percent car-ownership deficit.
Moove plans to use the funding to build a full-service mobility firm that democratizes vehicle ownership in Africa. The financing will be limited to mobility entrepreneurs who guarantee better payback as they use their cars for income-generating purposes.
“It became clear to us that people aren’t buying cars in Africa because there’s no access to finance,” Delano told TechCrunch. “When you look anywhere else in the world, you have financing in most parts of the developed world when you try to buy a car. It’s that way in the UK, or Europe and the U.S. And that’s what’s driving mobility drive and vehicle sales.”
Speedinvest and Left Lane Capital led the Series-A round. Other investors in the round included DCM, Clocktower Technology Ventures, thelatest.ventures, LocalGlobe, Tekton, FJ Labs, Palm Drive Capital, Roka Works, KAAF Investments, Class 5 Global, Lendable Co-Founder Victoria van Lennep, Verod and Kepple Africa Ventures. Joining them was Emso Asset Management, an existing investor in the company.
