Kenyan insurtech Lami’s bid to acquire Bluewave collapses
Kenyan insurtech Lami Technologies in February last year announced its acquisition of Bluewave, another startup within the insurance space, to expand its product offerings and enable it to scale into new markets in Africa — but it has now emerged that the deal fell through months later. TechCrunch has exclusively learned that at the time Lami went public with the acquisition, only a two-year “strategic partnership agreement” was in place. However, Bluewave founder Adelaide Odhiambo told TechCrunch that ground had been laid for an acquisition once Lami’s fundraising campaign, which had taken off in earnest around the same time, closed. Lami went on to raise a $3.7 million seed extension led by Harlem Capital. Odhiambo, who joined Lami as head of partnerships, claims that the terms of the deal, including the acquisition cost, started changing, forcing her to walk away in August last year. In the meantime, Bluewave had licensed its tech to Lami, and onboarded partners and employees as per the agreement. Lami declined to comment. Odhiambo told TechCrunch that Bluewave “entered into the …