Last week in brief…There was a distinct sense of déjà vu about private equity deals in Africa last week. As with the prior week, The Abraaj Group made some headlines, this time announcing a deal that gives it a stake in Société d'Articles Hygiénique or SAH, the owner of the Lilas suite of products, a household name in personal care products in Tunisia and other North African markets. SAH is publicly listed these days, having been one of Emerging Capital Partners' portfolio companies until they exited it via the company's IPO on the Tunisian Stock Exchange in late 2013. Abraaj acquired its interest by buying a 49% stake in JM Holdings, a majority owner of producer of disposable household and personal care products.

And Old Mutual Group was making deal news again this week, this time through the insurer's property division. In a $62 million debt/equity deal, Old Mutual Property is backing Kenya’s Two Rivers Development, acquiring a 10% equity stake in newly issued stock and providing a loan that is convertible into an additional 40% equity holding. It's the first real estate transaction in East Africa for the Old Mutual Group, and will be the company’s largest real estate holding outside South Africa.

The big news on the fundraising front was Prudential's commitment of $375 million for a new investment platform to be managed by LeapFrog Investments. The vehicle will target deals in the life insurance sector and will look to deploy the capital over the next three to five years in the continent’s more buoyant economies, notably Kenya, Nigeria and Ghana.

Kibo Capital held the final close for its second generation fund at $58 million which will make growth equity investments in SME and Mid-market companies across a number of sectors. Kibo Fund II held its first close at $50 million in July 2014, some 30% of which was raised from a mix of pension funds, family offices and other institutional investors, while the balance of the capital was provided by the International Finance Corporation, the African Development Bank, DEG, CIEL and Anglo Mauritius.

In addition to deal and fundraising news items we have already covered in this piece, both Abraaj and LeapFrog made additional announcements last week . Abraaj revealed that it no longer owned a stake in Integrated Diagnostics Holdings or IDH in November last year following a gradual exit from the investment over the prior year. In December 2014, Abraaj sold a 21% stake in the Egyptian diagnostics service provider to private equity investor, Actis, followed by a more significant stake sale in May 2015 when IDH was listed on the London Stock Exchange. Details on how much the sale returned to Abraaj were not revealed.

And in the latest of a series of recent senior executive hires and moves the impact investor has made to support its growth, LeapFrog announced the appointment of two new partners. Karima Ola, whose career has included positions at African Development Corporation or ADC and Nick Moon, who originally joined the firm in 2012 have both been appointed to the firm’s partnership ranks.

Allan Cunningham

Allan Cunningham

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.

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