Silicon Valley’s Plug and Play to open centres in South Africa, Morocco

Silicon Valley accelerator and venture capital (VC) company Plug and Play plans to open its first African office in Johannesburg this year.

The accelerator — which is behind names such as Google, Logitech and PayPal — made the announcement in a Covid-19 webinar series hosted last week.

Former Goldman Sachs investment banker Grace Legodi will be heading up Plug and Play’s South Africa office. The accelerator currently has 36 locations across the world.

Plug and Play marketing director Allison Romero confirmed to Ventureburn in an email yesterday that the accelerator is planning to open two offices in Africa, namely in Morocco and Johannesburg.

Silicon Valley accelerator and VC fund plans to open two locations in Africa, in Morocco and Johannesburg

“We are still in the early stages of launching our Johannesburg office, with no specific dates set for the official kick off,” she explained.

The company said in the webinar last week that it will also keep a close eye on other cities in South Africa such as Cape Town and Durban. If there is a need to expand then it will consider doing so, it said.

Plug and Play has an ecosystem of 20 000 startups, 400 major corporate partners and over 180 venture capital firms across 36 international locations.

Featured image: Plug and Play via Facebook