Nigerian online dating platform Friendite.com and sister company Frienditeplus.com hope to raise up to US$500,000 funding at the forthcoming Web Summit to be held in Dublin,Ireland in November, the companies’ founder said.
In an interview with HumanIPO, Okeke Emeka, founder of Friendite.com said the funds are needed to strengthen the platform, to reach out to more potential users, and to expand across Africa.
“We will also use it to make sure that our mobile app becomes available on every platform, and it will help us achieve our primary targets of 2.5 million registered users this year,” he told HumanIPO.
Emeka said a lot has been done to build and improve the platform already.
“We were too busy with building and making the platform better, but now we are good and ready for the VC’s,” he said.
The founder told HumanIPO investors would find a lot of things about the company attractive, saying that Friendite.com presents a safe investment.
He said they are counting on: “The passion we have for what we do, and the fact that within just one year and few months we have achieved quite a lot. We are currently the only dating and social site ranked in Nigeria according to startupranking.”
“Most importantly, [the investors] will recoup their investments in a very short period,” Emeka said.
“There is also the fact that we are solving a problem and we understand the problem we are solving quite better.”
He said the platforms are already generating revenues although these revenues are ploughed back to improve the company.
“We’ve generated revenues from Google adsense, direct ads like inside ad placements. One of our biggest customers for now is Nigerian Breweries Plc. [But] whatever we generate we always put it back to the business to keep it growing,” Emeka said.
The company is trying to solve the problem of socialization in Africa by striving to become Africa’s largest dating and social networking site and expanding the social circle of Africa.
