Afrigather 
Kenyan-based restaurant procurement administration startup, TopUp Mama has a brand new identification. The corporate introduced their rebrand right now in a press assertion shared with TechCabal.
TopUp Mama(now Caantin), which operates in Nigeria and Kenya, allowed eating places and meals distributors to restock by a digital platform. The startup sourced provides from distributors and farmers and delivers stock to distributors and different end-of-chain customers. It’ll now proceed its operations below a brand new title. “This new model identification and enhanced platform embody our dedication to boosting the restaurant trade’s contribution to Africa’s GDP and offering higher financing entry for eating places and suppliers,” the corporate assertion reads partly.
A part of the rebrand contains the launch of an enhanced procurement platform to assist eating places handle distributors. In its two years of operation, the startup claims to have labored with over 4,300 eating places, from native family-owned institutions to well-known chains like Mr Biggs in Nigeria and Sheraton Lodge in Kenya, who used TopUp Mama to handle procurement. Caantin additionally provides stock financing for its prospects.
“Over the previous decade, we’ve seen super developments in front-of-office restaurant operations, with platforms like Sq. and Toast enhancing funds, and Uber Eats and DoorDash enabling on-line shops and digital transactions. Nonetheless, outdated strategies for vendor funds and provide orders persist,” stated Njavwa Mutambo, Founder and CEO of Caantin.
Njavwa Mutambo, who co-founded TopUp Mama in February 2021, says he hopes Caantin will remodel back-office operations for the meals enterprise and assist scale back the price of gross sales.
Caantin says it grew income by 270% final yr and financed hundreds of thousands of {dollars} in stock, underscoring demand for liquidity options for eating places and suppliers. The income progress and have to construct a greater answer that mixed all its choices at scale, led the workforce to rebuild TopUp Mama as Caantin.
In March 2022, TopUp Mama closed $1.7 million in seed funding bringing the entire quantity it had raised to $2.16 million. TopUp Mama plans to succeed in 50,000 companies in Kenya and Nigeria, TechCrunch reported in Might final yr.
Caantin is enjoying in a market that’s more and more changing into enticing for buyers as a result of enormous procurement gaps that exist on the continent. Final yr, amid a enterprise downturn, a Nigerian procurement platform, Vendease, raised $30 million in fairness and debt funding to increase its operations in Africa, a testomony to the rising buyers’ urge for food for tech-powered farm-to-table options.
