The archive · Commerce & Marketplaces · Strategic decision · 2017–2025
Sky.Garden's Amazon-for-Kenya bet: $5.2M raised, failed round, two rescues, gone
Sky.Garden bet Kenyan SMEs would sell on a mobile Amazon-style marketplace; a failed 2022 round nearly killed it, and rescuer Lipa Later collapsed in 2025.
Sky.Garden
What the business is
Sky.Garden was a Nairobi-based mobile-first e-commerce marketplace connecting small Kenyan businesses to buyers, with end-to-end fulfillment, 24-hour delivery in Nairobi, and an 8% commission per transaction.
Starting capital：$1.2M seed (2018) and a $4M Series A (2021) led by SANAD Fund for MSME with Aavishkaar and Uncovered Fund — about $5.2M in venture funding; acquired by Lipa Later for ~KSh 250M (US$1.6M), which then invested another KSh 250M in the 2023 relaunch.
How it started
Danish founders Martin Majlund and Christian Grubak launched Sky.Garden in Nairobi in 2017 to help small Kenyan retailers digitize online and offline sales. The platform promised an Amazon-like experience in a market where Jumia was the only comparable player, with 24-hour delivery in Nairobi and cash-on-delivery built in because payment cards were rare.
What happened
After a $1.2M seed and a $4M Series A in 2021 (SANAD Fund for MSME, Aavishkaar, Uncovered Fund), Sky.Garden served more than 15,000 sellers. In September 2022, as venture funding froze across emerging markets, a follow-on round failed; Majlund gave staff 30 days' notice and planned an October 16 closure. In November 2022 an unnamed investor bought the IP and the Kenyan company, and TechCrunch later reported Lipa Later as the acquirer. In late 2023 Lipa Later injected KSh 250M (~$1.6M) to relaunch Sky.Garden as a social-commerce ecosystem — Sky.Commerce, Sky.Wallet, Sky.Logistics, Sky.Tickets — with BNPL, targeting 100,000 merchants.
How it ended up
Gone: Lipa Later itself was placed under administration on March 24, 2025 after failing to raise fresh funding, two years after acquiring Sky.Garden — ending the marketplace's second life.
Background
Sky.Garden's bet, launched in Nairobi in 2017 by Martin Majlund and Christian Grubak, was that Kenya's small businesses would sell online through a mobile-first, Amazon-style marketplace — one platform handling catalog, payments, fulfillment and last-mile delivery, taking 8% of every sale. It promised 24-hour delivery in Nairobi and built cash-on-delivery in because card payments were rare, positioning itself against NYSE-listed Jumia in a market where e-commerce was still early.
The model grew reach but not economics. After a $1.2M seed and a $4M Series A in 2021 led by SANAD Fund for MSME, the platform served more than 15,000 sellers and became a recognizable Nairobi brand. But African e-commerce is cash-intensive: no reliable national courier forced in-house dispatch teams, and consumer hesitation meant COD loops that are expensive to run. By September 2022, with venture funding freezing across emerging markets, a follow-on round failed and Majlund gave staff 30 days' notice, planning to close on October 16.
Sky.Garden was rescued twice, which made the end drawn out rather than abrupt. In November 2022 an unnamed investor bought the IP and the Kenyan company — TechCrunch later identified the buyer as BNPL fintech Lipa Later. In late 2023 Lipa Later injected KSh 250M (~US$1.6M) to relaunch Sky.Garden as a social-commerce ecosystem with Sky.Commerce, Sky.Wallet, Sky.Logistics and Sky.Tickets, aiming for 100,000 merchants and layering in buy-now-pay-later.
The second life lasted barely a year. Lipa Later, itself carrying debt from the acquisition and a KSh 500M 2023 bond, was placed under administration on March 24, 2025 after failing to raise fresh funding. With its acquirer gone, Sky.Garden — already an insolvency survivor — stopped operating. The story is a running example of the 2022–2025 Kenyan startup winter, where at least eight tech startups folded in under a year.
What has to be true
- Sky.Garden bet Kenyan SMEs would leapfrog to a marketplace model, but African e-commerce's unit economics — COD, no courier, card hesitancy — were never covered by its 8% commission.
- It depended on a steady flow of venture capital in a market where investors pulled back sharply in 2022; one failed follow-on round triggered the closure notice.
- The rescue strategy compounded risk: Lipa Later bought the platform while struggling itself, then collapsed two years later, so Sky.Garden's survival depended on another startup's balance sheet.
- The pivot to social commerce and BNPL in 2023 was an attempt to escape marketplace economics, but it needed exactly the fresh funding that never arrived.
What can be applied
A marketplace needs logistics, trust and payment rails that Africa's cash-based markets don't have yet; Sky.Garden's 8% take couldn't fund them, and its rescue buyer was as fragile as the startup.
Aftermath
As of September 2, 2026, Sky.Garden no longer operates: after its failed 2022 funding round and planned October closure, Lipa Later acquired the IP and Kenyan company and relaunched it in December 2023 as a social-commerce brand with a KSh 250M investment. Lipa Later was placed under administration on March 24, 2025 after failing to raise fresh funding, with a Moore JVB administrator appointed, ending Sky.Garden's second life. Early investors' returns were written off; the platform joined Sendy, Kune Foods, BRCK and others as Kenyan tech closures of the 2022–2025 downturn.
Sources
- Sky.Garden, Kenya's Amazon-style marketplace, faces closure after funding fell through
- Tech firm SkyGarden dodges closure after investor buyout
- Sky.Garden relaunches after a Kshs 250 Million Investment from Lipa Later Group to Power Social Commerce in Kenya
- Lipa Later Shuts Down
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