💵 2023 💵 The Year of the Debt 💵

Start-ups in Africa raised $2.9 billion in funding in 2023, a significant YoY drop

Let us start by wishing you a Happy New Year! We hope that 2024 will be a healthy, joyful and successful vintage for you all! It is also an opportunity for us to thank you for your continued support: we reached 430k unique views in 2023 alone, and a total of 8,800 subscribers, almost 1,000 of which have already signed up for our 2023 Start-up Funding Round-Up LinkedIn Live on Jan 17 (!).

For our first post of 2024 analysing the ecosystem’s performance in 2023, let’s look at the big numbers: last year, start-ups in Africa raised at least $2.9 billion through deals $100k and above. That’s if we count all types of deals (equity, debt, grants etc.), but exclude exits. For reference, we tracked 19 exits in 2023 worth over half a billion dollars, almost entirely thanks to two Tunisian success stories: InstaDeep’s acquisition by BioNTech and Expensya’s acquisition by Medius.

Funding on the continent fell -39% YoY. In the context of a global slowdown in VC activity, this performance is actually better than most might have feared. Overall, 500 start-ups raised at least $100k in Africa in 2023, compared to 821 in 2022 (also -39% YoY). This therefore means that the average deal size has remained stable between 2022 and 2023, again a pretty encouraging fact given the global climate.

Beyond the total number, what is very interesting to note is that many start-ups in Africa have turned to debt to finance their growth. Indeed, the amount of debt raised reached $1.1 billion, a +47% growth YoY; in comparison, equity funding fell by -57% during the same period. In 2022, start-ups in Africa had raised 19 cents of debt for every $1 of equity they’d secured. In 2023, this number went up to 65 cents, and debt made up 38% of all funding raised (vs. 16% in 2022)…

Where did that funding go? What sectors did better than others? How many investors were involved in those deals?… We know these are some of the questions you’re asking yourselves right now, but don’t you worry: in January we’re doubling up to bring you as many answers as possible. Stay tuned! And of course we’re expecting you on January 17 for our LinkedIn Live. For more details: