H1 2026: Fintech, Spiro, and the rest

Fintech led with 41% of funding raised while Spiro alone accounted for 24%, driving up Climate Tech numbers

In the same way that the $1.36b raised by start-ups in Africa in H1 2026 (exc. exits) was heavily focused on a few markets, the sector picture is one of concentration, with two sectors alone - Fintech and Logistics & Transport - capturing 76% of all funding raised.

Fintech ($556m, 41%) remained the largest sector, while Logistics & Transport ($472m, 35%) followed closely, driven by the “Spiro effect” as the EV giant’s $327m raise in H1 alone accounted for 24% of all the funding raised on the continent (and 70% of all L&T funding) last semester. Completing the top 5 are Agri & Food ($93m, 7%), Waste Management ($60m, 4%) and Energy & Water ($50m, 4%).

Given that total numbers tend to be heavily influenced by a few large deals, it is tricky to establish long-term trends at a sector level. That said, at 35% Logistics & Transport (again) is definitely on a high as its share of annual funding never went above 13% (in 2024). By contrast, Energy’s 4% share represents a serious underperformance compared with previous years (between 20% and 27% in 2023-2025).

As most Logistics & Transport funding (starting with Spiro) was EV-related, and given the good performance of Climate Tech-related sectors like Waste Management for instance, the share of funding going to Climate Tech ventures - a category that straddles multiple sectors - reached 39% in H1 2026. This is higher than in 2024 (34%) and on par with 2025 (38%).

Now if we rank sectors by start-up count instead of funding raised, the story is much more balanced. Fintech (48, 25%) still had the largest number of funded ventures raising funding during the semester, but the second spot was hotly contested by three sectors with almost the same number of ventures each: HealthTech (29), Logistics & Transport (27), and Agri & Food (26). On the positive side, it means that the ecosystem has more breadth than the funding view might imply; however, it also reveals how hard it is to raise larger tickets in some sectors.

As far as Climate Tech is concerned, its share of the total number of start-ups raising funding in H1 2026 (30%) is lower than its share of funding raised (39%), but this is on trend with previous periods (28% in 2024 and 29% in 2025).

Voilà, that’s it for today. I’m sure you know this by now, but all the analysis is based on our proprietary database, tracking start-up deals across the continent since 2019. You can access the database here, and newsletter readers continue to get a discount using the usual code. See you next week for a quick look at July (Yes, another month is almost over…). Cheers! Max

And because you read this post all the way to the bottom, you get a short clip of Bunny, the puppy we adopted last weekend (and whom we’ll blame for any typos in this post):