🚀 $2 billion 🚀 and beyond

April closes with $430m+ in transactions, driven by Sun King's $260m Series D

Until the last week of the month, with around $140m raised, April was going to be a relatively quiet month, compared to the first quarter of the year (~$480m in Jan, ~$630m in Feb, and ~$710m in March). But with Sun King’s $260m Series D in particular, the ecosystem ended up raising a total of ~$430m in April*. Sun King’s round is only the sixth Series D ever recorded on the continent, and the largest one to date, just above Flutterwave’s $250m February 2022 round; overall, it is the third largest deal ever disclosed. Fintech continues to lead, with 32% of the amount raised so far in 2022. Cumulatively, start-ups in Africa have already raised $2.25 billion* in the first four months of the year. This is 2.5x times the amount that had been raised by the end of April in 2021 (5x 2020, 8x 2019). It is also already more than half of the total amount that was raised in 2021 ($4.4bn). The $2 billion milestone was reached in 17 weeks, almost twice as fast as in 2021 (30 weeks). If the ecosystem can maintain this momentum and keep raising over half a billion dollars a month on average throughout the year, it is on track to raise almost $7 billion in 2022. How will the global venture funding slowdown affect the continent though? Time will tell…

* This number does not include the rumoured acquisition of PEG Africa by Bboxx initially reported at $200m. This is why the total raised of $2.25bn as of May 1st is slightly lower than what was shared in our teaser for the Asoko Insights newsletter on Sunday. An updated graph is available below. More generally, the most attentive of you will also have noticed that historical numbers evolve slightly over time; these adjustments are due to the fact that we constantly check and adjust our deals database (available to you with a discount) as new information becomes available :)

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