Over the past five years, high-profile visits to African tech ecosystems by Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, Google CEO Sundar Pichai and Alibaba founder Jack Ma have been signposted as marks of validation. Now, Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon and the world’s richest man, can be added to the list of global tech leaders drawn to the promise of African technology startups. Chipper Cash, a cross-border, peer to peer payments service, has raised $30 million in a Series B funding round led by Ribbit Capital with participation from Bezos Expeditions, Jeff Bezos’s personal venture capital fund. It’s the first investment in an African startup for Bezos’ fund which has also backed global tech brands including Uber, Twitter, and AirBnB.
SOURCE: QUARTZ AFRICA