Nigerian social commerce startup, Bumpa, raises $4 million seed round led by Base10 Partners
Nigerian social commerce startup, Bumpa, raises $4 million seed round led by Base10 Partners, the largest black-led fund in the world, with participation from Plug & Play Ventures (through their commerce fund), SHL Capital (Sahil Lavingia, CEO of Gumroad), Magic Fund, Jedar Capital, DFS Labs, FirstCheck Africa Angel Program, E62 Ventures, Club14, and Fast Forward Ventures.
Social commerce is a fast-growing sector, particularly on the African continent. Over 384 million Africans use social media, and there are over 281 million online shoppers on the continent. The market is predicted to grow by 70.3% annually to reach US$8 billion in 2022 and record a compound annual growth rate of 55.2% between 2022–2028, according to the Q1 2022 Social Commerce Survey.
One startup taking advantage of the social commerce boom is Nigerian social commerce company, Bumpa. Founded in 2021 by Kelvin Umechukwu and Adetunji Opayele, Bumpa was created after the duo worked together on HostCabal, a web hosting company.
As internet usage spreads across the continent, the allure of social commerce grows, particularly for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) across Africa. Mediums like Facebook, Whatsapp, and Instagram help these small businesses attract customers conveniently and with minimal overhead costs. For the 44 million SMEs scattered across Africa, these social media platforms have changed the way they interact with customers.
Bumpa exists to give superpowers to small business owners; helping them launch their business online with a website they can manage on their mobile device, manage their inventory, engage their customers, keep online records of their inventory, sales and customers, and get detailed analytics of their business across all the channels they sell.
With millions of Africans coming online yearly, there is a huge opportunity for us to empower small business owners with tools to digitize and grow their businesses online.
Umechukwu and Opayele got a keen understanding of the social commerce space in Africa while they were creating custom e-commerce websites for entrepreneurs with HostCabal, and with the advent of the lockdown and the consequent slowdown of business for SMEs across the globe, demand for their product grew rapidly. That demand spurred them to build a company.
