First close for Afrigreen Debt Impact Fund
French fund manager Green Invest and investment advisor Echosys Invest announced the first closing of their new fund, the Afrigreen Debt Impact Fund, raising 87.5 million euros, which will be used to finance on-and off-grid solar power plants for small and medium-sized commercial and industrial consumers in Africa.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
Microtraction leads investment in Nigerian digital health platform
Famasi Africa, a Nigerian digital health platform, has raised a pre-seed round, led by Microtraction with participation from other angel investors and early customers.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
Triple Jump launches EM-focused Financial Inclusion Resilience Fund
Triple Jump has announced the launch of the Triple Jump Financial Inclusion Resilience Fund (FIRF). The fund will focus on providing subordinated debt to financial intermediaries serving micro, small and medium-sized enterprises (MSMEs) and low-income borrowers in emerging markets. FIRF aims to serve as a catalyst to improve the solvency position of these financial intermediaries, allowing them to continue and increase their lending activity to MSMEs and low-income borrowers.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
Standard Bank advises Vivo Energy on the creation of a pan-African energy champion
Standard Bank has advised Vivo Energy on its combination with Engine. By combining Engen and Vivo Energy, the group will be on elf the larges energy distribution companies on the continent.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
South African car subscription business raises $100
Planet42, the car subscription startup addressing transport inequality by putting cars in the hands of people who cannot access traditional bank credit, has raised $100 million in combined equity and debt funding. The $15 million equity round was co-led by Jasper's and ARS Holdings, with participation from existing and new shareholders, including Rivonia Road Capital, which also provided a $75 million credit facility. Private investors contributed a further $10 million in debt financing. The funds will enable Planet42 to rapidly scale its business and meet its ambition of providing 1 million cars worldwide.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
Spear Capital in Zimbabwe deal
Private equity firm Spear Capital has concluded an investment deal with Greenwave Milling, a manufacturer and distributor of high-value basic commodities throughout Zimbabwe. The transaction was made via one of Spear Capital's subsidiaries, Superior Food Group Africa Ltd.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
South Africa: Third Way, Mahlako, and Mergence in solar energy deal
South Africa’s Aventro has received investment from Third Way Investment Partners, Mahlako Energy Fund and Mergence Investment Managers to increase its shares in the 100MW Redstone Concentrated Solar Power Project.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
African e-logistics platform raises US$13mn
Jetstream Africa, an e-logistics platform for African exporters and importers, has raised S13 million in a combination of debt and equity financing. The new investors include Proparco, ASC VC, Octerra. Cauris Wuri Ventures Seed9, The MBA Fund, W Fund and family offices, among others. Existing investors Alitheia IDF and Golden Palm also participated in the round.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
InfraCo Africa invests in Kenyan rural internet provider
Mawingu, a Kenyan-based internet service provider, successfully closed its Series B investment round bringing onboard new investor InfraCo Africa.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
Rwanda: AlphaMundi invests in electric motorcycle company
AlphaMundi Group, through its AlphaJiri Investment Fund (AJIF) in Mauritius, invested $1 million in Ampersand, a Kigali-based -mobility company that assembles electric motorcycles and provides users with battery swap station networks to power the vehicles. AlphaJiri's investment will support Ampersand in its mission of providing clean and affordable mobility solutions across East Africa.
Source: Africa Private Equity News
African insurtech Curacel raises US$3mn in seed funding
Nigerian insurtech startup Curacel, an AI-powered platform for claims processing and fraud management in Africa, has secured US$3 million in seed funding to roll out new solutions and support its expansion into North Africa.
Source: Disrupt Africa
Anti-phishing startup Sendmarc lands US$7mn
AlphaMundi Group, through its AlphaJiri Investment Fund (AJIF) in Mauritius, invested $1 million in Ampersand, a Kigali-based -mobility company that assembles electric motorcycles and provides users with battery swap station networks to power the vehicles. AlphaJiri's investment will support Ampersand in its mission of providing clean and affordable mobility solutions across East Africa.
Source: TechCrunch
Apis Growth Fund II announces its investment in EZRA
London and Singapore, 25th January 2023 – Apis Growth Fund II (the “Fund”), a private equity fund managed by Apis Partners LLP (“Apis Partners”), a UK-based asset manager that supports growth-stage financial services and financial infrastructure businesses, announces today its investment in EZRA, a micro-lending fintech which provides “easy and rapid” credit solutions across Africa and emerging markets.
Source: Apis
B Investments exits TotalEnergies Egypt
B Investments sells entire stake in TotalEnergies Egypt: BPE Partners’ B Investments has agreed to sell its entire 6.38% stake in TotalEnergies Egypt to TotalEnergies Marketing Afrique (TEMA) for USD 27.6 mn, the company said in a statement (pdf).
Source: Enterprise
Chimera Abu Dhabi backs Egyptian fintech business
The value of the Egyptian firm’s 20 percent stake was $200 million. Currently, this fintech company is also negotiating with other investors to attract additional financing of $ 60 million under the new deal. If the intention of additional investments is realized, the value of the company will exceed $ 1 billion.
Source: PaySpace Magazine
Costanoa and Norrsken22 back identity verification platform
The importance of KYC and identity verification in an increasing fintech landscape like Africa’s cannot be overemphasized. As thousands of financial institutions serve millions of Africans, stringent regulatory requirements are needed to keep hackers and fraudsters at bay, which is why investor interest in startups offering KYC and identity verification services is intensifying.
Source: TechCrunch
E Squared funds agribusiness
In December 2022, impact investor E Squared Investments participated in a follow-on funding round with Nambu Group, an insect protein company founded by Allan Gray Fellow Founder, Lowell Scarr, that converts food waste into high-value protein feed for the poultry, pork, fish farming industries as well as the exotic pets market based in the Eastern Cape.
Source: E Squared
Egyptian health tech Yodawy raises US$16mn
Without proper government-led public health initiatives, healthcare expenditures, including insurance and pharmaceutical drugs, can burden individuals and households.
Source: TechCrunch
Gameball raises $3.5M to scale its CRM platform
The uptake of customer relationship management (CRM) tools has grown immensely over the last few years such that the market size is expected to experience a 12.5% compound annual growth rate, and be worth $145.79 billion in the next six years.
Source: TechCrunch
Pembani Remgro Infrastructure Fund hits first close at US$245mn
The Pembani Remgro Infrastructure Fund has achieved a successful first closing of $245m, with the aim of achieving final close during 2015 at a target fund size of $500m.
Source: Africa Global Funds
Phatisa invest in The Manipal Group Company
• Expansion capital will enable Manipal to consolidate its current market position, plus expand geographically to serve the growing African market, whilst promoting sustainability.
Source: Phatisa
PressOne Africa closes $600,000 pre-seed round African insurtech Curacel raises US$3mn in seed funding
PressOne Africa, a firm that creates business phone systems for entrepreneurs, has raised $600,000 in a pre-seed round led by Ventures Platform, with participation from Voltron Capital and a slew of excellent angel investors.
Source: Tech In Africa
Zuri Health receives funding from Morocco's UM6P ventures
Founded in 2021, Zuri Health is a telemedicine startup that offers patients in Africa access to high-quality, reasonably priced healthcare using mobile apps, websites, WhatsApp chatbots, and SMS services.
Source: Further Africa
STANLIB Infrastructure Fund II to acquire stake in Upington Solar
STANLIB Infrastructure Fund II has agreed to acquire a majority stake in the 258 MW Upington Solar Power complex from two Norwegian investors, Scatec and Norfund.
Source: Africa Global Funds
Vantage closes fourth mezzanine fund
Vantage Capital has announced the final close on its fourth mezzanine fund with $377m of commitments secured from a mix of European and US-based commercial investors, as well as a host of development finance institutions (DFIs) that include IFC, BII, SIFEM, DEG, Norfund, Swedfund, Finnfund and EIB.
Source: Africa Global Funds
Partech Africa II reaches first close above target
Partech has announced the first closing of Partech Africa II at €245M, above the target fund size.
Source: Africa Global Funds
SC Ventures partners with Yabx
SC Ventures, Standard Chartered’s innovation, fintech investment and ventures arm has partnered with Yabx, a company incubated by Comviva and part of the Mahindra Group, to address a deep-rooted need for responsible consumer finance in Africa.
Source: Africa Global Funds
Spear Capital backs Greenwave Milling
Spear Capital has concluded an investment deal with Greenwave Milling, a manufacturer and distributor of quality high-value basic commodities throughout Zimbabwe.
Source: Africa Global Funds
DFS Lab and the Stellar Development Foundation Launch Quarterly Blockchain Bootcamp for Startups
DFS Lab and the Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) have launched the SCF Startup Camp, a 5-day virtual and global bootcamp.
Source: Africa Global Funds