🚀 Africa's top investors of 2021

These 5 investors are involved in 1/3 of all early-stage deals in Africa

Back by popular demand (our April post on the same topic has been our most-read so far), this week we are looking at the most active investors in Africa, and Boy, haven’t they been busy!

• Launch Africa (with more than a deal a week on average 🤯), Kepple Africa, Y Combinator and Flat6Labs are still amongst the most active, and they’re joined by LoftyInc Capital Management, who complete the Top 5 most active investors of 2021 so far.

• This Top 5 have been involved in 1 in 3 ‘early-stage’ deals ($100k to $1m) on the continent so far this year (97 out of 295). In total, they have already invested in 127 deals in 2021.

• They have been most active in Nigeria (41 deals), Egypt (30), Kenya (15) and South Africa (15). In total, they have invested in start-ups in 14 different countries. The only country they have all invested in at least a deal is Egypt; actually they have all invested in at least 4 deals in the country.

• The sector the Top5 investors mostly invest in is… fintech - which represent one third of the deals they participated in -, followed by logistics & transportation (12%) and healthcare (10%).

• 72% of the deals they’re involved in are with start-ups with an all-male funding team, in line with the market overall. However, only 9% of the start-ups they invested in in 2021 so far have a female CEO, which is lower than the average (14%).

• Now of course this data is based on publicly disclosed deals, and a few more shared in confidence by investors, and it is not impossible that a couple more investors would deserve to make this list (Future Africa for instance)…

We welcome questions or comments, as always, and thank you for your continued support. If you’re interested in the full database of deals, you can find it here, but I suggest you also check your mailbox for a special offer if you subscribe to this newsletter… ;)