Kenyan Logistics startup Sendy has shut down its retail and supplier trading platform known as Sendy Supply and sent home 20 percent of its workforce due to a lack of funds.
This is despite securing a $20 million Series B led by Atlantica Ventures just 2 years ago.
This is not the first time Sendy, which is competing with rivals such as Kobo360 and Lori Systems, has sent home employees, Back in August, the startup laid off 10% of its 300-strong workforce with CEO Mesh Alloys saying the move was necessitated by the “current realities impacting tech companies globally.”
Things are not looking good for Sendy who had laid major plans to raise $100 million by 2022 to fund the digital logistics platform’s plan to expand in western and southern Africa.
The company, which started operations as a delivery service before spinning off e-commerce and retail supply platforms, has now shut down the latter business line to focus on sellers placing goods in its warehouses for marketing and delivery.
We know how this goes, just like Kune and others before it, first they pivot, then they close business.
I recently wrote a piece on why I think the African startup scene is a mess if you want to look at it.
According to a statement online, Sendy is out of funds and struggling to get more funds to run its operations.
The story here is that Sendy is struggling to get funding to run its operations. pic.twitter.com/6D9gYn7LQP
— Francis Waithaka 💙 (@waithash) October 5, 2022
Here are some reactions online:
Sendy was the fulfilment partner for Skygarden, skygarden is going under and Sendy has issued a statement announcing a change in their business model. 1+1
— K'uk'ulkan (@Jahmu__) October 6, 2022
Sendy has been operating for more than 4 years now and it is still considered as a Startup?
— Jobu (@ItsJobu) October 6, 2022
Sendy is a scaleup. They should accept they have grown.
— 𝕊𝕒𝕣𝕦𝕟𝕚 (@SaruniBM) October 6, 2022
