The Nigeria Mobility-as-a-Service (MaaS) firm, Treepz, has raised $2.8 million in a seed round to expand into East Africa. The $2.8 million raised was a combination of both the initial seed raised, which was accumulated around $1.3 million, and the current seed raised of about $1.5 million.
The acquisition was funded by new investors including Dubai-based Blanford Capital, Japan-based uncovered fund, and Jonomi Capital, and Egypt-based Jedar Capital. Alongside the previous $1.3 million used to acquire Stabus, a Ghanaian company, for expansion across the continent. The deal is closing at around $2.8 million.
Also, the acquisition would enable Treepz to gain easy access into East Africa and also take over Ogabus’s staff and operations. Currently, according to Treepz, Ogabus has over 70% of the bus operators in the country and also about 50, 000 customers that make use of the bus within Uganda cities.
The CEO, Onyeka Akumeh, told TechCrunch that, they would be able to service most cities in Uganda, and the good thing about East Africa is that they have seamless borders between countries, and it is easy to move from Uganda to Rwanda, Uganda to Tanzania, Tanzania to Burundi and so forth. He also explained furthermore that the plan is to expand to Tanzania and Burundi first. Tanzania and Burundi are the places they will pay attention to next year. Also, he made mention of other places like Ethiopia, Togo, Benue, and others.
In Lagos state, they have three verticals: The Daily Treepz which is the main operation and operates like Uber; The Travel Treepz that runs Intercity, and the final one which is the corporate services that are mainly for business.
In Uganda, according to the CEO, Onyeka Akumeh, the concentration would be mainly on Travel Treepz and Corporate services. This is because it is easy to launch what the team is already used to.
