FirstFounders and Terra Industries: The $11.75M Venture Studio success story

When David Lanre Messan and Samuel Kemeshi launched FirstFounders, they set out to deviate from the standard startup accelerator model. Operating as a venture studio, the firm’s mandate is centred on the “pre-idea” and earliest R&D stages. For the VC firm, it goes beyond gains and returns; it is about supporting dreamers with the resources to build lasting solutions to Africa’s most pressing challenges. 

Over the past five years, FirstFounders has supported more than 1,000 builders through its studio and the F2Nation community. With a current portfolio of six startups, including PocketLawyers and KorinAI, Africa’s first AI music lab, the bootstrapped studio has deployed over $1 million in support of founders building category-defining solutions. However, its most notable success story to date lies in its early backing of Maxwell Maduka, the technical mind behind what is now Terra Industries.

Terra Industries’ first believer 

Supporting the R&D Phase In 2023, Maduka co-founded TerraHaptix (now Terra Industries) with a mission to develop affordable bionic solutions for people with disabilities. During this high-risk prototyping phase, FirstFounders acted as a critical launchpad. Rather than a traditional capital injection, the studio provided the essential physical and strategic infrastructure necessary to move a hardware concept toward reality. 

Within eight months, operating out of the FirstFounders studio in Yaba, Lagos, the TerraHaptix team designed custom PCBs and secured 40 pre-orders valued at $80,000, which eventually led to a partnership with Igbobi Hospital to supply 300-500 units annually. To facilitate real-world testing, FirstFounders Partner Samuel Kemeshi leveraged his network to connect the team with an amputee volunteer for bionic prototype trials, while CEO David Lanre Messan provided the mentorship required to navigate early-stage hurdles. 

The venture studio environment often serves as a laboratory for business model evolution. To support their early prototyping, FirstFounders embedded the team within its R&D space in Alagomeji, Yaba. It was here that the founders made their strategic pivot toward drone-based surveillance, leveraging the studio’s resources to refine their new intelligence monitoring model.

Onwards and forwards

Today, Maduka, alongside his co-founders, has gone on to build one of the biggest drone defense startups in Africa, changing the existing narrative that African startups are incapable of developing globally competitive hardware on the continent. This follows its recent announcement of an $11.75 million seed round, with participation exclusively from foreign investors. The round was led by 8VC, a venture capital firm founded by Palantir co-founder Joe Lonsdale. Other participants included Leblon Capital, Silent Ventures, Valor Equity Partners, Lux Capital, Nova Global, as well as angel investors Alex Moore and Meyer Malka. 

For FirstFounders, the success of Terra Industries serves as definitive proof of concept for the venture studio model in Africa. By providing R&D space and advisory when a startup is little more than an idea, the studio bridges the gap between raw talent and global venture readiness. True to its name, FirstFounders remains committed to being the ‘first believer’ in entrepreneurs intentional about solving Africa’s biggest challenges.