Last week in brief... We lead this week with a story involving a Fintech startup and its high profile investors, some of whom are backing the firm for the second time. The company, JUMO, has raised $55 million in a mix of debt and equity from a group of investors including Goldman Sachs and LeapFrog Investments, both of whom backed the firm's earlier round in September 2018. JUMO will use the new capital to launch new products and enter new markets in Africa and Asia. With this round, the firm has now raised a total of $145 million.

A hospitality JV between Actis and Westmont Hospitality has acquired the Sheraton Casablanca located in the heart of the Moroccan city, close to the Old Medina and harbor. The price paid for the 309-key property, which will be operated by Westmont Hospitality, has not yet been disclosed. The new owners are planning to fully refurbish the property and take advantage of the opportunity offered by Morocco's expanding economy and an undersupply of hotels.

Tangerine Life, one of Verod Capital's second private equity fund’s portfolio companies is acquiring a majority stake in ARM Life Insurance in a deal that propels the newly-combined business into fourth place in Nigeria’s life insurance sector. Both life insurance businesses are complementary rather than competitive. Previously operating as Metropolitan Life, Tangerine Life’s client base has historically been dominated by the corporate sector through its group life offering while ARM Life has a strong focus on the retail life insurance sector and annuity products.

In Kenya, Amethis has led a group of DFI and other investors backing a 60 store-supermarket chain. The deal forNavais, which saw participation from DEG, IFCand the MCB Equity Fund, gives Amethis a minority stake in the business. The company plans to expand its network of outlets within the East African country further.

Africa Finance Corporation is leading an equity deal to construct and operate a 60MW wind project in Ghoubet, near Lake Assal in Djibouti. The transaction sees AFC in partnership with Great Horn Investment Holdings, Climate Fund Managers and Dutch development bankFMOinvest $63 million into the project. As part of the deal, AFC’s Chief Investment Officer, Oliver Andrews, and the multilateral institution’s Head of Project Development, Amadou Wadda join as non-executive directors to the Board of the project.

South Africa’s Competition Commission has given the go-ahead for Capitalworks' acquisition of DGB, one of South Africa’s largest independent wines and spirits production and distribution companies. If it goes ahead, the deal would see a newly established entity backed by Capitalworks Private Equity Fund III take control of the Midrand-headquartered business, which was launched in 1990. Should it go ahead, the fund would own a business with controlling interests in five assets around the globe in addition to five South African companies.

The IFC is considering a commitment to SPE Capital Partners' Africa Industrialization Fund. The development finance institution’s board is set to meet towards the end of this month to evaluate the potential $15 million investment in the fund which had already raised $80 million by its first close. Businesses with enterprise values ranging between $30 million and $80 million in size would be the ideal fit for the fund’s investment strategy.

SIMA reported last week that it has almost fully deployed its senior debt fund. To date, SIMA Fund I has invested $85 million of debt in 26 companies that are financing, manufacturing and/or distributing individual solar home systems to customers in the fund’s target regions. That figure is expected to rise to $90 million by the end of this month.

More than 30 investors have invested in the fund. In February last year, the US Government’s development finance institution OPIC provided an anchor investment of $20 million in the fund. Other investors include several European DFIs, faith-based pension funds, foundations, endowments, and individuals.

And finally, some interesting job changes to report. Britain's CDC announced the appointment of its first Climate Change Director last week. Amal-Lee Amin, a well-respected climate change expert, is filling the newly created role and will play an instrumental role in the development and launch of CDC’s new climate change strategy which is expected to be rolled out later this year.

Mediterrania Capital Partners is promoting one of its own to take on the role of Director of Sustainability at the private equity firm. Rajaa Berrkia, who originally joined the fund manager in 2009, has been appointed to the position in which she will be responsible for all aspects of the firm’s impact investing process and research, making sure the Mediterrania’s portfolio companies implement, manage and enhance their environmental and social performance.

IFU's former director for Southern Africa, Johnny Ohgrøn Hansen, has stepped into a general partner role at Zebu Investments. He started working as Senior Portfolio Director with the firm in February where he'll lead the private equity firm’s efforts to build value into its portfolio companies, developing their growth strategies and enhancing Zebu’s pan-African network.

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

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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