ABH 2022 GRAND FINALE

MEET THE ABH 2022 TOP 3 WINNERS

1^ST PLACE WINNER

Elia Timotheo, Founder and CEO of East Africa Fruits Co. (Tanzania) https://www.eafruits.com/

Elia has grown East Africa Fruits Co into the largest food distributor/aggregator in Tanzania by modernizing systems never implemented in East Africa before. By distributing fresh produce directly from farms to B2B customers, they ensure no brokerages and less waste. The software resolves market inefficiencies by pairing crops with market demand, boosting efficiency, and yielding 60% more earnings for farmers as they tackle Africa’s 4-billion-dollar problem of post-harvest food wastage.

2^ND PLACE WINNNER

Tesh Mbaabu, Co-Founder and CEO of Marketforce Technologies (Kenya) https://marketforce360.com/

Tesh Mbaabu is an African serial technology entrepreneur who lives to blend commerce and technology. MarketForce is a B2B Commerce platform that empowers over 200,000 neighbourhood merchants across 5 African markets to source, order and pay for inventory, access financing and earn more by reselling financial services in their communities.

3^RD PLACE WINNER

Nadia Gamal El Din, Founder and CEO of Rahet Bally (Egypt) https://rahetbally.com/

Nadia Gamal El Din studied finance at the American University in Cairo, after which she started her professional career as an assistant brand manager at Procter & Gamble. She became a mother at the age of 24 and realized there was a huge market gap when it comes to supporting new moms. Consequently, in 2015 she founded Rahet Bally, an all-inclusive platform to support Egyptian mothers financially, physically, emotionally, and intellectually, both online and in person, on top of Rahet Bally Discount App for Moms, Rahet Bally Mama Fitness Programs, the Cloud by Rahet Bally, and Mumerz.com.

OTHER 7 TOP FINALISTS THAT MAKE UP THE TOP 10 & EACH A WINNER OF A PORTION OF THE GRANT MONEY

• Flavien Kouatcha Simo, Managing Partner of Save Our Agriculture Sarl (Cameroon) https://www.saveouragriculture.com/

Flavien, a Cameroonian engineer by training, runs an agricultural company that designs and manufactures aquaponic units for individuals and professionals wishing to produce large-volume organic food as close as possible to sales areas, i.e., in town. Their system is a solution to climate change, the land challenge of young African farmers, and the increased use of agricultural chemicals.

Amena Elsaie, Co-Founder of Helm Consulting (Egypt) https://www.saveouragriculture.com/

Amena is a multiple Award-winning entrepreneur. Created in 2014, Helm supports 4000+ persons with disabilities, promotes their social inclusion, serving more than 200 entities and working with top notch experts from 16 countries. In addition to sponsorships and grants, Helm is the first provider of localized and customized inclusion solutions in the region, awarded multiple times as innovative global best practices and successful business models by Zero project, JICA, Rise Egypt, etc.

Amadou Daffe, CEO/Co-Founder of Gebeya Inc. Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) https://gebeya.com/

Gebeya.com is a Pan-African freelance talent marketplace that identifies the Best of African Talent and matches them with cutting-edge projects from selective customers with a goal of solving one of Africa’s biggest challenges: employment. Their tech-driven marketplace connects remote African tech talents with employers globally. The continent needs to generate 12 million new jobs every year to keep unemployment at bay. Startups, SMBs, and corporations in industries like telecommunications and transportation rely on Gebeya to be a one-stop shop for talent capable of building new products and services to scale up their businesses.

• Prince Agbata, Co-founder and CEO of Coliba Waste Management Services Limited (Ghana) https://t.co/FzktHDo8U7

Coliba is an award-winning and leading Ghanaian plastic waste recycling company operating in Ghana & Ivory Coast.  Prince co-founded Coliba to address the issue of plastic pollution and to promote environmental sustainability. Plastic waste is a serious problem in West Africa, and Prince decided to tackle this issue after losing his best friend in a flood disaster caused by plastic pollution. Coliba collects, sorts, and recycles plastic and metal garbage. This initiative employs over 110 workers.

• Francine Munyaneza, Founder of MUNYAX ECO (Rwanda) https://www.munyaxeco.com/

Growing up as a refugee, Francine had no access to electricity. Francine’s founded Munyax Eco to harness the Africa’s recurring problem – lack of access to electricity and to solve Rwanda’s energy challenges in rural and urban areas by providing solar equipment adapted and tested for the African continent. Francine is well known for her gender-oriented recruitment and sales strategy which is to bring women into the fight against climate change while empowering them economically. To date, over 10,000 people across Rwanda, DRC and Burundi have access to clean energy, thanks to Munyax Eco’s women-led and focused solutions.

• Shona Mcdonald, Founder and Executive Director of Shonaquip Social Enterprise (South Africa) https://shonaquipse.org.za/

Shona founded her company to address the challenges of children with mobile disabilities living in peri-urban and rural areas of South Africa. Shonaquip’s range of tailor-made mobility products and health services can be assembled and maintained even in conditions with limited resources. Their inclusive early childhood education training, social services, advocacy and research directly impacts nearly 20,000 individuals with disabilities and their families annually.

• Elmarie Pereira, Chief Operations Executive, Co- Founder & Acting CEO of Memeza Shout (PTY) Ltd (South Africa) https://memeza.co.za/

Elmarie is on a mission to make South Africa safer. Memeza is an ICT Social Enterprise providing affordable innovative safety technology and monitoring services to lower income communities who don’t have access to private security, as well as assists government and corporates with specialized community-based project deployment services. To date Memeza has created over 2700 income opportunities for youth, and reduced GBV by 67% in low-income communities focusing on solving social ills.

MEET THE ABH REPRESENTATIVE/SPOKESPERSON

Zahra Baitie-Boateng, Head of Partnerships & Programs, Africa’s Business Heroes

Zahra Baitie-Boateng is the head of partnerships and programs of Africa’s Business Heroes (ABH). ABH is a philanthropic initiative sponsored by the Jack Ma Foundation and Alibaba Philanthropy with an aim to support and inspire the next generation of African entrepreneurs across all sectors who are building a more sustainable and inclusive economy for the future of the continent.

Prior to her role at ABH, Zahra worked at Alibaba’s global retail marketplace AliExpress as a senior business development manager and at Alibaba’s China wholesale marketplace 1688 as special assistant to its president.

Zahra’s prior experience includes working at Dalberg Global Development Advisors. At Dalberg, she consulted for governments and organizations across several African countries on a range of issues related to youth unemployment, tourism development and agriculture transformation policies. She also worked at Development Reimagined, where she served as China director focusing on Africa-China trade facilitation. Her experience also includes working as an analyst at Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation to promote industry collaboration between Ethiopia and China.

Zahra is a native Ghanaian and a graduate of Yale University and Schwarzman College, Tsinghua University.

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