Grace Ashiru
Nigerian startup CutStruct Technology has raised $600,000 in a pre-seed funding round. This money will help the company grow and scale its B2B construction procurement application, LiveVend.
CutStruct, a company started by John Oamen and Tayo Odunsi, has made LiveVend, a platform for construction procurement that lets buyers like contractors and real estate developers work with vetted vendors and use other services like trade credit, goods-in-transit insurance, and transportation.
Oamen says that the startup connects people who want to buy and sell construction materials. All of the hard work is done in the background.
CutStruct’s users interact with a simple platform, but behind the scenes, the company is doing hard things like vetting vendors, organising logistics, checking insurance, ensuring orders are fulfilled, and financing.
The US$600,000 pre-seed round of funding for the startup is being led by Zedcrest Capital, DFS Lab, and LoftyInc, with help from angel investors like Kola Aina.
Stephen Deng, a partner at DFS Lab, said, “We invested in John, Tayo, and the Cutstruct team because we also believe in the construction industry’s unrealised potential in Nigeria and across Africa.”
Tech-enhanced, specialised B2B platforms like LiveVend have the potential to improve the experiences of buyers and sellers in industries that are usually very traditional and, as a result, unlock the enormous potential to digitise important value streams.
The team’s knowledge of the industry and desire to offer relevant services based on their experiences have been impressive.
Techbuild’s Take
A procurement plan must deal with several risks, such as managing contracts, finding the best materials, and keeping track of vendors and budgets. So, sound planning is needed to ensure that procurement action goes off without a hitch.
The construction industry needs a sound procurement system because on-time project delivery is essential. Paper-based tasks that need to be done by hand are often prone to mistakes, but thanks to technology, startups like CutStruct are giving people better options.
These platforms give the sector an effective way to buy things. Owners, Site engineers, project managers and consultants make complex tasks easier and help people make better decisions, which speeds up the time it takes to finish a project. It also gives them limited access to data and every sign of how the business works.
Remember that these systems may offer a complete solution, including sourcing products, managing suppliers, and providing comparative quotation reports that help construction firms choose the right vendors.
