We appreciate the overwhelming support and time you took to celebrate the unveiling of Villgro Africa with us. This issue of the Villgro Africa Newsletter features a special highlight video for your future reference, an insightful episode of our podcast alongside exciting portfolio updates.
“As we look into the future, the tailwinds are now on our side to scale our impact across the African continent. In the next 5 years, we will be scaling deep, scaling wide, and scaling equitably. Part of scaling broad will be taking on a bold initiative to collaborate with local and regional hubs in joint incubation initiatives while scaling wide will be deepening the level of support offered to enterprises." ~ Wilfred Njagi, Villgro Africa CEO
View the Villgro Africa Launch Highlights
In the second episode of a three part series on Fundraising: Demystifying the local vs expat founder funding gap, we host James Copple, (Founder of Strategic Applications International (SAI) and Servant Forge) and Chrispinus Onyancha, (Founder of a Ugandan-based health-tech startup clinicPesa) - on the role of team dynamics in fundraising. They bring together their opinions on whether Ivy-League networks help in fundraising and how founders can set Big Hairy Audacious Goals for the team to follow. Listen to the Podcast
Ilara Health Awarded $1.1M Grant by Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
Ilara Health, a health tech enterprise that provides point of care diagnostic testing to small primary care clinics in Kenya, has received a $1.1 million grant from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
The grant will be used to improve maternal health outcomes in Kenya by developing effective antenatal care (ANC) interventions and tech-based solutions for pregnant women unable to access essential services during the COVID-19 pandemic. Read More
MamaOpe Recognised as one of the 100 Meaningful Businesses in 2020
We are delighted for Olivia Koburongo, CEO of MamaOpe, to have been recognized as one of the Meaningful Businesses 100 this year. The award celebrates business leaders across the world combining profit and purpose to help achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. Read More
The Eastern Africa Bioeconomy Conference
The Villgro Africa team had the opportunity of participating at the 1st East African Bioeconomy Conference. The regional conference, under the auspices of the BioInnovate Africa Programme, brought together scientists, technologists, and innovators from academia, public, and private sector to network and share their experiences of bioeconomy development in Africa, including appropriate enabling environment to foster its growth. The team did due diligence on an array of bioinnovations from the region which were showcased at the conference in a bid to attract new investment opportunities. Villgro Africa will work closely with BioInnovate Africa to deliver a 4-day Bioscience Innovation Bootcamp for the Innovators from the programme.