Build your start-up in 10 weeks with Antler East Africa

We encourage you to apply if you are a founder grappling with an ambitious problem statement, with unique insight into how to solve it, and have a strong tech/business background. Most founders joining Antler’s programs have 5-15 years of prior work experience.

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We typically accept founders that are pre-product. Antler helps early-stage founders iterate, improve, and articulate the problem they want to solve, and helps refine the quality of their solutions. Founders also will benefit from prior validation of the problem/solution (user research, stakeholder conversations, and prototype experiments) in the community.

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Antler East Africa can help founders come up with an idea from scratch. However, founders must be interested in going after ideas and problems with a unique/deep insight and take quick steps to validate them. We understand that things change quickly with rapid iteration and customer feedback. Some founders may change their idea entirely in the first few weeks.

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We are sector agnostic and welcome startups from any industry, with innovation as our primary criterion. We invest in both tech and tech-light businesses, emphasizing the importance of using creative and impactful solutions to address market needs. While not every business needs technology as its core driver, we seek founders leveraging innovation—whether through tech-enabled processes or unique approaches—to build competitive, scalable, and transformative ventures.

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Yes, we bring together founders from different backgrounds/skills and provide an environment to interact and form connections based on aligned goals and values. Antler does not assign co-founders, with the matching decision ultimately left to the founders.

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At Antler, we invest in the leader of the team and respect their decision to choose a co-founder. If you already have a co-founder, we welcome this as part of your journey. While your co-founder does not need to apply separately, we do require the opportunity to meet them and assess their suitability for the program to ensure alignment and support the venture's success.

We also accept founders and teams who have already launched their products. Antler helps these teams accelerate product-market fit and growth, and gain access to further rounds of capital. Early-stage startups do not necessarily go through the program as some startups will likely be too advanced and hence will only be evaluated for a direct investment.

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Finding your first backers is an outstanding achievement. Typically, founders and teams who have raised in previous rounds will go through our acceleration track.

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For individuals: You will be interviewing with Antler team members and partners to evaluate your background, your motivation to join Antler, your problem-solving abilities, and your ability to work with others. You do not need a deck for these interviews—these are conversations to get to know you better. 

For existing pre-seed/seed startups: You will be interviewing Antler team members and partners to discuss your startup, team, and motivations. Upon receiving your application, we will shortlist founders for an introductory pitch call.

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For ideas built from scratch at Antler through our programs: If the Antler Investment Committee (IC) determines that your team and idea are exciting and viable, your team may receive an investment from the Antler Africa Fund. The Antler Africa fund will then provide $100k for 10% shareholding. To support in a tough funding environment, we make available an additional $100k to match your next investor ticket and terms.

For existing pre-seed/seed startups: If the Antler IC determines that your team and idea are exciting and viable, Antler can join your ongoing pre-seed / early seed round with $100-400K tickets at a negotiated valuation.

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The Antler East Africa community is open to founders across Africa who are committed to relocating to Nairobi, Kenya and building their product in this market. For the upcoming cohort, we are specifically focused on founders who see the value of immersing themselves in the vibrant Nairobi ecosystem during the first phase of the program and are dedicated to establishing their ventures within this market.

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Accelerators typically start working with preformed teams who have identified a product-market fit. Getting to that stage can be incredibly challenging. You need a team, a network of advisors, and access to capital. Antler removes these barriers related to entrepreneurship for people who are interested in starting a company from day one. We identify and invest in exceptional individuals and early-stage teams with the potential to build global companies. We are a founder-led VC located in 30 locations with 1300+ portfolio companies representing 40 industries. We don’t just invest, we create an ecosystem for great companies to be built.

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