Kenya startups tied with their Nigerian and South African counterparts on the amount of funding raised in Q1 of this year at Sh12.93 billion each, new data show.

Latest statistics from Africa: The Big Deal, an American online newsletter that publishes funding startups on the continent, also shows that Egyptian startups raised Sh7.9 billion.

“Togo completed the top five, thanks to Gozem’s $30m Series B funding round. Almost half of the funding (46%) was raised by fintech start-ups ($53m for LemFi, $38m for Naked etc.), followed as usual by energy (18%) and logistics & transportation (10%),” the report shows.

The report also highlights the challenges that women face when raising funds compared to their male counterparts.

“Just over 2% of the funding was raised by female CEOs ($10m), with the largest such round being a $6.2m grant to South African biotech African Biologics,” it adds.

“If we were to remove grants from the total, the share of funding raised by female CEOs in Q1 2025 would fall to 0.7%.”

As per the report, 79 percent of the funding went to either solo male founders (11 percent) or male-only founding teams (67 percent).

Read Also: Bolt drivers’ commissions to attract 16pc VAT tax

“Diverse founding teams attracted 20% of the total – which isn’t great, but is actually not a bad performance compared to previous quarters. A mere 1% was invested in solo female founders or female-only founding teams..”

Last year, Kenyan startups secured Sh82.3 billion ($638 million) in funding, highlighting Kenya’s growing dominance in the continent’s tech and innovation space.

The country’s strong performance was driven by significant deals in the climate tech sector, with companies such as d.light, SunCulture, and BasiGo attracting substantial investments.