AltSchool Africa secures $1 million to train entry-level tech talents in Africa
AltSchool Africa has secured $1 million in its pre-seed funding to train entry-level tech talent in Africa.
AltSchool Africa has secured $1 million in its pre-seed funding to train entry-level tech talent in Africa.
The fund has the participation of Olugbenga “GB” Agboola, Flutterwave's co-founder and CEO; Shola Akinlade, Paystack co-founder and CEO; Folarin Falana, a Nigerian artist popularly known as Falz and Akitoye Balogun, a Nigerian artist known as Ajebutter22.
The VCs in the round include Voltron Capital, Nestcoin, Pledges and Odba VC.
Nigeria's unemployment rate is at 34% and continues to leave many tertiary institutions graduates in its trail. AltSchool Africa believes that the traditional schooling system is insufficient to get university graduates decent jobs.
Launched in October 2021 by Adewale Yusuf, Akintunde Sultan and Opeyemi Awoyemi, the Nigerian-based edtech startup provides a solution as an online school with a curriculum to improve/upskill non-technical people with technical and soft skills while partnering with higher institutions to provide diploma certificates.
Related: A roadmap to becoming a techie
Like most startups focused on providing tech skills, it adopts an income-sharing model where students do not have to pay for the tuition until they get a job. However, they have to pay an application fee of ₦10,000 ($20).
AltSchool employs an income-sharing agreement (ISA), so when students complete the program and get hired, they’re expected to pay $500, which can be paid in full or installments — $50 over 10 months or $100 over five months.
I'm thrilled to announce that AltSchool Africa has raised a pre-seed round. We've received amazing support from the ecosystem since the day of the launch, that's why we are reserving a small token for the public.
— Adewale Yusuf (@AdewaleYusuf_) February 1, 2022
Visit https://t.co/pXu2RCrXfZ or https://t.co/3ygWXszRzh to invest pic.twitter.com/xjjy9IwHh6
However, AltSchool Africa will omit the ISA model for the next batch. Instead, the company will use a subscription model, where students pay between $20-$50 monthly for the duration of their program.
Since its launch, more than 8,000 people from 19 countries — including 14 African countries — have applied to participate in AltSchool Africa’s software engineering program, which will start in April, with most entries from Nigeria, Ghana, Uganda, Kenya and Botswana.
With this investment, the startup will focus on content, growth, and building its technology, starting with its learning management system (LMS). According to Adewale Yusuf (CEO) the startup will launch its Schools of Product, Data, and Blockchain in Q2 2022.
When these schools launch, they will offer courses in product design, product management, and product marketing, amongst others. Currently, AltSchool runs a School of Engineering currently runs three courses: frontend engineering, backend engineering, and cloud engineering.
