The archive · Consumer Apps · Strategic decision · 2018-2026
Carry1st: Africa's top game publisher won by betting on payments, not hits
Cape Town's Carry1st became Africa's leading mobile game publisher by betting local payments: Riot, Activision, Supercell and Sony now plug into its rails.
Carry1st
What the business is
Carry1st develops, licenses and publishes mobile games across Africa (Call of Duty: Mobile among them) and runs Pay1st, a payments and virtual-goods commerce platform that lets players pay in local currency via mobile money, bank transfer, cards and crypto; founded in Cape Town, South Africa, in 2018.
Starting capital：$2.5M seed led by CRE Venture Capital (2020); $6M Series A with Riot Games, Konvoy, Raine Ventures and TTV Capital (May 2021); $20M Series A extension led by a16z with Avenir and Google's Africa Investment Fund (Jan 2022); $27M pre-Series B led by BITKRAFT (Jan 2023); over $60M total by the Sony Innovation Fund deal (Disrupt Africa, 2024-01-31).
How it started
Cordel Robbin-Coker, Lucy Hoffman and Tinotenda Mundangepfupfu founded Carry1st in Cape Town in 2018. Robbin-Coker, who had worked in investment banking in New York, saw Africa's smartphone adoption racing ahead of any way to pay for games: storefronts priced in dollars ignored mobile money and local currency. Carry1st first proved demand with its own titles (Carry1st Trivia was the No.1 game in Nigeria and Kenya in April 2020, about 1.5M downloads) and raised a $2.5M seed led by CRE Venture Capital to fund its real ambition: becoming the region's publisher of record, in the mold of Sea's Garena.
What happened
Carry1st shifted from studio to full-stack publisher, signing seven games from six studios (Tilting Point's SpongeBob: Krusty Cook-Off, CrazyLabs, Raketspel) and building Carry1st Shop, a virtual-goods marketplace paid in local currency. Riot Games and Konvoy led a $6M Series A in May 2021; in Jan 2022 a16z led a $20M extension, its first investment in an Africa-headquartered company, with Avenir and Google's Africa Investment Fund. In July 2022 The President, made by Nairobi's Mekan Games through Carry1st's CrazyHubs accelerator, hit No.1 on US download charts, and revenue grew 10x over the year. BITKRAFT led a $27M pre-Series B in Jan 2023, the same month Riot chose Pay1st to pilot local payments in Africa.
How it ended up
Carry1st is still scaling. In Jan 2024 Sony Innovation Fund: Africa made it the fund's first investment (size undisclosed, from Sony's $10M Africa allocation), with PlayStation and console partnership on the table; Disrupt Africa tallied over $60M raised and partners including Riot Games, Activision (Call of Duty: Mobile) and Supercell. By 2026 Carry1st ran its Africa Cup for the third year as the official African qualifier for the Call of Duty: Mobile World Championship, with Mentos back as a sponsor for the Abuja finals, extending the publishing and payments thesis into esports.
Background
Carry1st was founded in Cape Town in 2018 by Cordel Robbin-Coker, Lucy Hoffman and Tinotenda Mundangepfupfu on the bet that Africa's young, fast-adopting phone users would make mobile gaming a mass paid category once players could actually pay in local currency. Its own Carry1st Trivia went No.1 in Nigeria and Kenya in April 2020 with about 1.5M downloads, validating demand before a $2.5M seed led by CRE Venture Capital.
The company then rebuilt itself from studio into full-stack publisher, signing seven games from six studios and adding Carry1st Shop, a virtual-goods marketplace accepting mobile money, bank transfers, cards and crypto. Riot Games and Konvoy led a $6M Series A in May 2021; a16z led a $20M extension in Jan 2022 as its first Africa-headquartered investment; The President hit No.1 on US download charts in July 2022; and revenue grew 10x that year. BITKRAFT led a $27M pre-Series B in Jan 2023 as Riot signed on to pilot Pay1st for local payments in Africa.
The payments bet turned competitors into customers. Sony Innovation Fund: Africa made Carry1st its first investment in Jan 2024, after Riot, Activision and Supercell had already become partners, and over $60M had been raised. By 2026 Carry1st ran the Carry1st Africa Cup as the continent's official Call of Duty: Mobile World Championship qualifier, with Mentos returning as a sponsor, and the company describes its mission as scaling awesome content in frontier markets by solving hard problems.
What has to be true
- Robbin-Coker had direct evidence before scaling: users in Nigeria, South Africa and Morocco paid readily for digital content when priced and collected in local currency.
- The wedge is hits-independent: monetizing third-party titles such as Call of Duty: Mobile and Riot's games scales without betting the company on any single own game.
- Owning payments made global incumbents partners: Riot, Activision, Supercell and Sony all needed a local collector, turning potential competitors into customers.
- The rails compound: mobile money, bank, card and crypto integrations create switching costs and data advantages a rival publisher cannot quickly copy.
What can be applied
In markets where nobody can pay, the bottleneck is collection, not content: own the payment and distribution layer, and global incumbents from Riot to Sony become customers rather than rivals.
Aftermath
As of 2026-09-04 Carry1st runs from Cape Town as Africa's leading game publisher and commerce platform, monetizing through Pay1st and the Carry1st Shop, with over $60M raised (Disrupt Africa, 2024). Sony Innovation Fund: Africa made it the fund's first investment in Jan 2024, exploring PlayStation opportunities; partners include a16z, BITKRAFT, Google, Riot, Activision and Supercell. The Carry1st Africa Cup is in its third year as the continent's Call of Duty: Mobile World Championship qualifier, with 2026 finals in Abuja and Mentos back as sponsor. No exit or shutdown has been announced.
Sources
- Carry1st has $4M to invest in African mobile gaming
- a16z, Avenir and Google back South African mobile games publisher Carry1st in $20M round
- African gaming startup Carry1st raises $27M from Bitkraft Ventures and a16z
- SA gaming startup Carry1st secures strategic investment from Sony Innovation Fund
- Carry1st and Mentos extend partnership for 2026 Africa Cup
spotted an error? The archive wants to know.
Your turn
You just read one. Describe what you are building, and see who is betting on the same thing.
Free account · 3 free questions · no card