Social commerce startup, Bumpa raises $4m seed funding

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In September 2021, Bumpa raised $200k in pre-seed funding…
Bumpa to expand business with its new $4 million investment
Bumpa to expand business with its new $4 million investment

African social commerce startup, Bumpa has raised $4 million in a seed funding round. The new fund will help the startup to execute its mission goal of helping underserved SMEs efficiently manage their business.

The round was led by automation-focused VC, Base10 Partners. It saw participation from Plug & Play Ventures commerce fund, SHL Capital, Jedar Capital, Magic Fund, DFS Labs, FirstCheck Africa Angel Program, E62 Ventures, Club14, and Fast Forward Ventures (led the last pre-seed round)

According to Luci Fonesca, principal partner at Base10, the investment indicates that her team has recognised the value the startup is providing.

She said,

Bumpa is building a mission that we love and were excited to get behind, enabling e-commerce and reducing friction for millions of SMBs. The more we spent time with Kelvin and Teejay, the more we saw that they are very special founders and have a powerful mission to build the defining e-commerce platform in Nigeria and across Africa.

Luci Fonesca, Principal of Base10 Partners.

It is important to note that this funding was duly executed at a time when venture funding market in Africa declined. For the Q3 of the year, venture funding in Africa has dropped by 54% YoY.

Read Also: We checked out the Bumpa app and here is what we think

Realising Bumpa’s vision

Bumpa wasn’t always a social commerce platform when it was first launched by Kevin Umechukwu and Adetunji Opayele.

The company was first known as SalesCabal, and one of its main goals was to introduce e-commerce to the MSMEs and business owners in the area by addressing their daily financial problems.

However, in an effort to offer more substantial solutions, the team announced the initial edition of their app, which was centred on giving business owners free websites and other online business management tools.

One of the most important features which were quite significant stance in the social commerce ecosystem was the integration with Meta bridging the gap between social media and digital commerce for online sellers.

In September 2021, Bumpa raised $200k in pre-seed funding and a $50k grant from the Google Black Founders Fund a few months after the round. This funding at that time was focused on staff expansion and the introduction of new features.

Read Also: Nigerian e-commerce startup, Bumpa closes $200k pre-seed round to improve support for merchants

Future plans for Bumpa

Speaking on the raise, Kelvin Umechukwu, CEO and Co-founder of Bumpa said:

The goal is to do three things: connect, innovate and scale. Bumpa
2.0 for us as a startup is to connect all the relevant tools, channels, and places that SMEs need all in one place: the Bumpa app. It is also to innovate by bringing simpler, automated ways to do any business transaction or operation on the app.

In order to better serve the expanding number of African SMEs in need of digital solutions, the firm plans to increase access to new African markets and the range of products it offers. Finally, Bumpa is trying to grow its team in order to reach this newly established milestone.

As it prepares to assist more merchants in achieving commercial success, Bumpa will also be growing its workforce.

“It is also to scale our user’s businesses, our position as key players in the African commerce
industry, and to scale the capacities and reach of the employees and even we, the founders”, the CEO concludes.


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