African focused talent outsourcing and incubator company, TalentQL, has raised $300,000 in a pre-seed funding round.
Lagos-based investment firm, Zedcrest Capital, led this round with participation from some other local investors. And this news comes after the startup launched last week with a premise to hire, develop, and manage remote talent for global companies.
Founded by Adewale Yusuf, co-founder of Techpoint Africa; Opeyemi Awoyemi, co-founder of Jobberman; and Akintunde Sultan, co-founder of DevCareer, TalentQL wants to “build a pipeline of quality talents for African companies as well as source and manage top local talents for leading international companies right from Nigeria.”
It also claims that it will double the quality of life of its talent while reducing their cost to a third. The company’s model includes building talent campuses in less crowded African cities with proximity to top tertiary institutions which combine to provide a fertile environment for talent development. Its first campus is in Ile-Ife, a city in Osun, Nigeria.
Speaking on the deal, Adewale Yusuf, who is the one-month-old startup’s CEO had this to say.
“This pre-seed funding allows us to kickstart this mission and we are convinced that what we are doing at TalentQL will change the African talent landscape. We believe that talent is Africa’s greatest export and as such needs to be developed and refined.
“We are grateful to the investors betting on us for the journey, our lead investor Zedcrest Capital and some of the known entrepreneurs and investors like Kola Aina, Prosper Otemuyiwa.”
In 2019, Zedcrest Capital, primarily known as a securities trading firm, launched its venture investing initiative. Named Ventures at Zedcrest, the initiative was to allow the firm partake in pre-seed, seed and Series A investments of startups within the continent.
While pointing out that TalentQL becomes the 20th company to have the backing of this initiative, Adedayo Amzat, CEO of the firm said:
“African talents are undoubtedly competing favourably globally, and TalentQL’s work will expand the available talent pool to improve further Africa’s representation in the global technology talent space.
It is a no brainer to be betting on the TalentQL team. They are entrepreneurs who have built successful businesses, and we have no doubt they will replicate the same success here.”
