Last week in brief...Private capital fundraising news dominated the reported activity in Africa last week. Of the items, the largest involved Alitheia IDF's Gender Smart Fund which held a second close. The fund is now three-quarters of the way to its final close target.
A joint venture between two women-owned, women-led private equity firms, the fund will SMEs owned and managed by women in high growth sectors such as agriculture, agro-processing, and manufacturing in Southern and West Africa. It's aiming to build up a portfolio of twelve businesses over its investment period, using capital, expertise and each of the joint venture's networks to transform these businesses into local and national market champions.
Having held the first close for its latest private debt fund in late January,impact investor responsAbility has added another provider of first-loss capital to the 10-year blended finance fund's list of LPs. EDFI ElectriFi is investing an undisclosed amount of capital for the fund, which has already achieved $151 million in commitments from both private and development finance institutions.
SPE Capital has a new LP for its Africa Industrialization Fund. The IFC is backing the planned $200 million fund with $20 million, adding to its pool of available growth capital for equity and/or quasi-equity deals in small and lower mid-cap companies in Egypt, Jordan, Morocco, and Tunisia. SPE is closing in in its final close target which it expects to reach by the fourth quarter this year.
In the venture space, Dubai-based Global Ventures has reportedly closed its first fund, winning commitments from some significant Middle Eastern institutions. The venture firm now has $50 million in hand to invest in startups in the MENA region. Established just two years ago, the firm has already built up a double-digit portfolio of startups. The most recent addition is Elmenus, a food and delivery startup based in Egypt, which raised a Series B in February.
The two deals we covered last week fall into the venture capital category. Of the ten investors backing 54gene's Series A round last week, six had backed the Lagos-based genomics startup previously. The latest round, led by first-time investor Adjuvant Capital, adds $15 million to the 15-month-old startup's coffers. The capital will be used to scale 54gene's genetic research operations and boost its genetics, bioinformatics, preclinical, clinical and commercial programs.
Eventtus's existing investors are providing an undisclosed amount of capital to the startup in support of their pandemic-inspired plans to develop an experiential virtual events platform. The firm expects the digital events space to take off as a result of the current COVID-19 crisis.
According to the firm's CEO, the company is working on a solution that is completely different from what's available in the market today. As well as providing the same functionality available to users of Zoom or Facebook Live, the new product will also incorporate everything that planners and event attendees look for in an event; information and networking wrapped up into a sleek and professional user experience.
That's it for this week. As always, you can review these and other stories by clicking through to this week's preview edition of the newsletter.
Allan Cunningham is a senior media executive who has spent the last 15 years of his career working for some of the world’s most respected M&A and Private Equity media companies including Dow Jones’s publications Private Equity Analyst and VentureWire and most recently, The Deal. He has built a number of successful digital and event content businesses, both subscription and sponsor-supported, delivering information and content-marketing services to clients in the M&A and broader deal ecosystem. He recently struck out on his own and launched Rowayton Press, a multi-platform media company focused on the private capital opportunities in emerging and frontier markets. Mr. Cunningham holds a Bachelors degree from Liverpool John Moores University in the UK.
cloud technology axon
KBV Group, participada por Abac Capital, ha adquirido una participaciÃ...
