Abu Dhabi–based venture capital firm Hashgraph Ventures has committed US$1 million to the Hedera Africa Hackathon, the continent’s largest Web3-focused innovation programme designed to accelerate digital transformation and broaden economic inclusion across Africa.
Hashgraph Ventures operates under the umbrella of The Hashgraph Association, a Switzerland‑based nonprofit dedicated to advancing education, certification, and innovation around Hedera-powered technologies. Through its investment mandate, Hashgraph Ventures supports high‑growth, early‑stage companies building real‑world solutions across blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI), and other deep‑tech domains.
The inaugural Hedera Africa Hackathon, held from August to October last year, brought together developers, founders, and students from more than 20 cities across the continent. Participants were challenged to design and build Hedera-powered applications across critical sectors such as finance, healthcare, telecommunications, sustainability, agriculture, and manufacturing. The event also emphasized emerging technology convergence, including AI, IoT, robotics, and quantum computing.
With hybrid online and in‑person participation, the hackathon attracted 13,000 developers and produced 1,300 project submissions, making it the largest decentralized innovation initiative ever hosted in Africa.
Following Hashgraph Ventures’ new pledge—and additional participation from United Gulf Financial Services (UGFS)—equity investment commitments for the next edition of the Hedera Africa Hackathon have now reached US$2 million. This is in addition to a US$1 million prize pool contributed by The Hashgraph Association and the Exponential Science Foundation.
Commenting on the announcement, Kamal Youssefi, President of The Hashgraph Association, stated:
We are pleased that Hashgraph Ventures is committing US$1 million to the Hedera Africa Hackathon. This not only reflects their dedication to advancing scalable, real‑world adoption of distributed ledger technology, but also recognizes the tremendous success of the Hedera Africa Hackathon as the largest Web3 hackathon globally.
He added:
We believe Africa’s developer ecosystem holds immense potential to shape the future of decentralized finance, AI‑driven innovation, and digital inclusion. The Hashgraph Association is committed to building the Web3 ecosystem across Africa and worldwide through collaborations with Hashgraph Ventures, Exponential Science, United Gulf Financial Services, and other partners. This is just the beginning.
