Grace Ashiru
Cape Town-based fintech startup Zazu has secured seed funding from Launch Africa Ventures as it pushes to become the go-to financial operating system for small and medium businesses across Africa. The size of the round was not disclosed.
Germain Bahri and Rinse Jacobs founded Zazu in 2024 with a simple premise: banking should work for founders, not against them. The startup positions itself as a “Finance OS” for African SMEs, bundling business accounts, invoicing, spend management, and bookkeeping into a single platform that takes the friction out of everyday financial operations.
Announcing the deal on LinkedIn, Bahri described the investment as the latest in a string of positive developments for the company, crediting consistent product improvement and fast execution for attracting investor attention. He noted that the funding lets Zazu push further toward its goal of transforming financial services for African entrepreneurs, adding that the team is still shipping what it considers foundational features even as it moves into its next growth phase.
With the deal, Zazu joins the portfolio of Launch Africa’s Seed Fund II, sitting alongside other fintech bets including Agridex, CreditCircuit, Liquify, and VaulFi.
Launch Africa Ventures, founded in 2020 by Zachariah George and Janade du Plessis, is one of the continent’s most active early-stage investors, focusing on seed and pre-Series A deals. The pan-African fund counts more than 180 portfolio companies across two funds in 25 African countries, a roster that includes fintech heavyweights Flutterwave, Kuda, Djamo, and Peach Payments. The firm has already closed 15 new investments in 2026.
The Zazu deal caps an eventful stretch for the investor. In June, Launch Africa backed Agridex and returned USD 2.5 million to limited partners in its 2020-vintage Seed Fund I, which turned DPI positive after recording 11 exits.
For Zazu, the priority now is sharpening its core product, with the startup signaling that it expects the Launch Africa relationship to deliver value beyond capital in the months ahead.
