Eight African e-commerce startups have been invited to apply for a Facebook-run accelerator that will offer them access to mentorship and training as well as the company’s technologies and networks.
Disrupt Africa reported in August on the launch of Facebook Accelerator: Commerce is a 12-week non-equity programme supporting innovative commerce startups who renew shopping experiences for buyers and sellers.
Throughout the virtual programme, the selected startups will have access to a dedicated Facebook mentor, comprehensive training, Facebook’s suite of products and technologies, and a valuable network of product experts and fellow founders to connect with.
In all, 36 innovative commerce startups in Europe, the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America have been selected to take part. They were chosen for having products focused on driving customer value, diverse and focused leadership teams, groundbreaking technology or research and evidence of business growth.
Eight of those were from Africa, with Egypt the best represented country. Three Egyptian e-commerce companies will take place in the accelerator, namely commerce chatbot-building platforms Botme and WideBot, and Convertedin, an ad automation platform for retailers and e-commerce businesses.
Two startups are from South Africa, in the shape of BoxCommerce , a platform for small and medium-sized businesses to create e-commerce websites, and ShoppingFeeder, a leading feed management and multi-channel marketing platform for online stores.
Kenya is also represented by two startups, in the shape of Digiduka, which helps informal retailers get access to digital inventory, and next generation addressing system OkHi, while completing the list of African participants is Ghana’s FeedGeni, a product feed generator that helps online merchants increase product visibility and sales by listing their products on shopping engines.
The programme officially kicked off last week, with startups connected with Facebook commerce experts and beginning their journey towards building solutions on commerce platforms that billions of people globally can use and benefit from.