Nigeria’s Eden Life expands to Kenya, acquires Lynk
Eden Life, Africa’s first home concierge services scheduling platform has acquired Lynk, a Kenyan gig marketplace in a move that will see Eden Life expand into Kenya.
The strategic acquisition, brokered by Enza Capital will allow Eden Life leverage Lynk’s successful platform that connects informal workers with end-users through automated job matching and standardized processes.
Eden Life, a subscription-based service that provides high-quality meals, laundry services and home cleaning to customers in Nairobi, was established in Nigeria in 2019. Its goal is to provide concierge services for busy professionals.
Lynk launched in 2015 and has since helped to create over 150,000 jobs in more than 2,000 informal sectors such as beauty, wellness, cleaning, maintenance, furniture, and decoration.
Having been hit by the covid-19 pandemic in 2019, the company’s major investor connected Lynk’s founders with Eden Life and coordinated a strategic acquisition – accelerating Eden Life’s expansion into Nairobi through Lynk’s established customer base.
“It’s truly exciting to continue the phenomenal legacy of the Lynk platform and be part of the evolution in recreating smart-service delivery solutions for busy Nairobians to manage their work-play lifestyle. The combination of the technology that powered Lynk to empower informal workers and the data-rich Eden Life app presents an immense opportunity to grow not just the menu of services, but also the number of people who can benefit from the platform.” – Country Lead at Eden Life Kenya, Akinyi Ooko-Ombaka.
Available on Google Play and the App Store, the tech-powered ‘concierge of comfort’ aims to remove the barriers to finding reliable household services in Nairobi, building on its success in Lagos – where the service has an 80% retention rate during the course of the last twelve months with MoM growth at 15%. The app’s robust architecture has enabled Eden Life to deliver more than 150,000 services in Nigeria since launching.
Aside from allowing users to select the specific chore they need to carry out, Eden Life’s user-focused platform allows users continually give feedback on all aspects of service delivery from quality to user experience.
Additionally, the app can be used to collect data based upon customer preferences and make suggestions based on previous experience. It also includes additional features like delivery time tracking and payments and billing and notifications that give users visibility and trust. The chores are overseen by “Gardeners” – the highly trained professionals who work with Eden Life service providers and end-users to ensure a seamless service.
We’re thrilled to build on the incredible growth we’ve achieved in Nigeria and to bring the Eden Life philosophy to connect quality service providers with consumers in a whole new way. Combining our platform with the knowledge and market experience of Lynk is a real dream matchup and we’re excited to work with our new team of world-class colleagues. Nadayar Enegesi, Co-Founder at Eden Life said.
The post-pandemic working life has seen more people working longer hours, leaving them with limited time to get key things done around the home. Eden Life is focused on disrupting the home services market by making life easier for the chronically time-poor tech-native professionals and executives, allowing them to channel their time into more productive activities as well as affording them more quality leisure time.
“Lynk leveraged technology to pioneer an industry in East Africa that provided training, support, career growth and income for thousands of informal workers since inception, and we are enthusiastic about this development. Eden Life’s proven track record of delivering quality home services in Nigeria, while now leveraging on what Lynk has built in Kenya, reinforces the positive trend and opportunity that increasingly exists in major urban centres across Africa.” said Mike Mompi, General Partner at Enza Capital.