Afrobility: Africa Tech and Business

#55: Apollo Agriculture - How the AgriTech platform is supporting smallholder farmers to scale across Kenya & Africa

Aug 28, 2022

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The Smallholder Farmer Platform - A Poll at Culture

Is There a Monetization Model That Makes Sense?

The Challenges of Smallholder Agriculture in Africa and Kenya

Food Inflation in Africa

What Does an African Farmer Look Like?

The Challenges in African Agriculture

African Markets Are Different From European Markets

Challenges in Agriculture in Africa?

A Challenge, but Opportunity Is Another Word for Challenge

Is There a Solution for Africa's More Older Farmers?

Kenya Is the Economic, Financial and Transport Hub of East Africa

Kenyan Farmers Are Not Productive, Right?

Kenya Is 20% Less Than the Global Average

Apollo Agriculture - The First Founding Story in Early History

The Biggest Opportunity for Farmers

Is Africa the Next Step to Build Something Similar?

The Equity Split Between the Co-Founders?

The Story of Apollo Agriculture

A Few Things About Fundraising

COVID - A Big Impact Investor in Africa

Using Equity to Run the Business Debt

What's the Big Deal on the Venture Capital Market?

Can I Call Bullshit on the Numbers?

Do You Know What You're Doing?

Kenyan Farmers - What's the Product Strategy?

A Farmer's Insurance

What if You Can't Pay Back the Loan?

The Risk of Not Using the Right Tools

The Skeptics of Partnerships

01:01:03 • 2min

A Farmer's Guide to UX and Design

01:02:47 • 2min

A Farmer's Guide to Using AI in Agriculture

01:04:26 • 2min

The Revenue Cost Side of Monetization

01:06:01 • 3min

Is There a Network Effect?

01:08:47 • 2min

Is Fair Fair Money a Good Way to Grow?

01:10:18 • 2min

Fair Money Loans - The Biggest Advantage

01:11:49 • 2min

Is It Better or Worse?

01:13:20 • 2min

The Penetration Opportunity Is Bigger for Apollo Than Any Bank or Family

01:15:11 • 3min

Is That What the Farmers Need?

01:18:16 • 2min

Is It a FinTech?

01:19:50 • 1min

01:21:20 • 2min

Fintech Versus Agriculture for Small-Agri-Players

01:23:06 • 2min

The Big Bull Case of the Future

01:25:13 • 2min

Can They Be Profitable?

01:27:22 • 2min

Uber Credit Scorers

01:29:10 • 2min

Is Kenya a Sweet Spot for Agro Partnerships?

01:30:56 • 2min

The Unique Business Model, Unique Customer Set

01:33:01 • 2min

Lift and Shift Models

01:35:03 • 3min

The Real Opportunity for Windfall Profits

01:38:01 • 2min

The Biggest Risk to Apollo's Business

01:40:24 • 2min

Getting More Farmers? Is It a Good Idea?

01:42:10 • 2min

What's the Difference Between the Bull Case and the Bear Case?

01:43:53 • 4min

Is There a Definitive Difference Between Value Investing and Growth Invest?

01:47:31 • 2min

Why Value Investors Will Never Pick a Growth Stock

01:49:17 • 2min

Bumpling's Best Investing Recommendations

01:50:55 • 2min

All I Want to Know Is Where I'm Going to Die

01:53:16 • 2min

I Have a Daily Strike and I Lost It

01:55:26 • 2min

Read-Wide Syncs My Highlights With Feedly

01:57:14 • 3min

Overview: Today, we’re going to talk about Apollo Agriculture, the Kenyan AgTech company - we’ll explore the Apollo story across the following areas

African agriculture context
Apollo's launch & early history
Product & monetization strategy
Competitive positioning & exit options
Overall outlook

This episode was recorded on Aug 21, 2022

Companies discussed: Apollo Agriculture, The Climate Corporation (WeatherBill), Pula, FarmDrive, Monsanto, FairMoney & Kuda Bank

Business concepts discussed: Agricultural Technology (AgriTech or AgTech), smallholder farmers, Risk mitigation, Debt funding, Customer acquisition costs (CAC) & Customer lifetime value (LTV, CLV)

Conversation highlights:

(06:10) - Agriculture context in Africa
(21:00) - Context on Agriculture in Kenya
(27:33) - Apollo founding story and founder background
(40:55) - Fundraising and growth
(55:14) - Product and monetization strategy
(1:17:58) - Competition and exit options
(1:27:53) - Bankole’s overall thoughts and outlook
(1:34:50) - Olumide’s overall thoughts and outlook
(1:49:36) - Recommendations and small wins

Olumide’s recommendations & small wins:

Interested in investing in Africa Tech with Olumide: Read about Adamantium fund & contact me at olumide@afrobility.com
Founders looking for funding: If you're a B2B founder working on Education, Health, Finance or food, please contact me for funding at olumide@afrobility.com
Recommendation: Little Ways The World Works: Article by Morgan Housel. Great article talking about how learning from different fields is very helpful. He goes over learnings from evolution, astronomy, biology, anatomy, etc
Recommendation: University of Berkshire Hathaway: Auto recommended by Kindle. Great. Chronicles 30 years of Berkshire Hathaway Annual meeting discussions
Small win: Beach gathering with friends, it was fun
Small win: Just got back from NYC 30 minutes before recording this episode, a lot of fun

Bankole’s recommendations & small wins:

Recommendation: Soul In The Game - Vitaly Katsenelson && Asake - Terminator && For My Hand - Burna Boy and Ed Sheeran
Small win: Beat my previous Readwise streak of 190 days!
Other content: CIA Factbook on Kenya, FAOStat Food production, Interdependence and modularity - Christensen institute , All I Want To Know Is Where I'm Going To Die So I'll Never Go There: Buffett & Munger – A Study in Simplicity and Uncommon, Common Sense

Investors, Operators, Entrepreneurs - We’d love to hear from you. Please email info@afrobility.com to share feedback