Congo-based Web3 Startup, Jambo, Raises $30m in Series A Round

Jambo, a Congo-based startup building a Web 3 user acquisition platform has raised $30 million in Series A funding round led by Paradigm, marking the native crypto investing giant’s first investment in Africa. Additional participation in the round comes from ParaFi Capital, Pantera Capital, Delphi Ventures, Kingsway Capital, Gemini Frontier Fund, BH Digital, Graticule Asset Management Asia, Shima Capital, Morningstar Ventures, and more.

The startup will deploy the funds into boosting its personnel strength by doubling its team across Africa by the end of the year to provide the critical talent required to educate the continent on the potential of Web3 technology. Also, Jambo has expansion plans as it looks to expand into 15+ additional cities by the end of the year to have over 200K active community members, students, and ambassadors affiliated with its educational efforts.

The startup will also look to improve its services as it looks to onboard engineers to build a Web3 super app that will enable Africans to trade crypto, buy and sell NFTs, experience play-to-earn crypto games, and access top-notch global web3 applications.

Founded in 2021 by siblings Zhang James and Zhang Alice, Jambo was created with the mission to onboard the next million (and potentially billion) African people to Web3. The startup is building the Web3 super app that will educate, bank, and entertain the continent. Jambo aims to pioneer the largest, most influential Web3 user acquisition portal across the continent and serve as the bridge between Africa and applications from around the world seeking to tap into the African market.

“As blockchain and fintech enthusiasts ourselves, we’re bullish on Web3’s potential to bring prosperity to every corner of Africa, where we are seeing the youthful, educated and smartphone-savvy population already embracing crypto at a rapid clip — Africa’s crypto market grew 1200% in value in the past year alone. Equipping the continent with the correct tools to better harness this disruptive technology, however, is no simple task,” James noted.

“As Paradigm’s first investment in Africa, we couldn’t be more excited to partner with the Jambo team in this next phase of growth. We see massive Web3 potential in Africa and it’s clear that James and Alice are uniquely positioned to build a durable on-ramp for the continent,” Casey Caruso, Investment Partner at Paradigm said.

Driven by the passion for true Web3 transformation in Africa, Jambo has revealed it will partner with others to launch the AfricaDAO investment fund to empower and invest in startups who share in its vision and mission to positively impact lives of millions across Africa for decades to come.

“We’re hard at work finalizing our ecosystem of Web3 apps and are excited to reveal more when the time comes,” James added.

The investment denotes the increasing acceptance of cryptocurrency, Non-fungible Token (NFT), the meterverse and web3 among African countries. Last month, the Central African Republic passed a bill to adopt bitcoin as a legal tender, making it the second country in the world, after El Salvador, to do so.