Last week in brief...Deals in Africa's private capital markets last week came in multplie flavours and multiple sizes. In the private equity sphere, there was a first. Investec Asset Management announced its first deal in the education sector. The asset manager's second private equity fund is taking a controlling stake in Richfield Holdings, a 28-year old provider of tertiary private education in South Africa.
The sector's one that holds alot of interest for Investec and the Richfield deal gives them a solid platform to add future acquisitions to. The firm's expansion plans within South Africa as well as across the continent for both its in-person and distance learning offerings will be supported by the investment.
On a smaller scale, and of debt rather than equity, Pearl Capital Partners is making an investment in Central Coffee Farmers Association or CECOFA, a farmer-owned primary coffee bean processor in Uganda. The funding will be used to help the company source and export larger volumes of Robusta coffee from its existing network of more than 3,600 smallholders as well as expand that network further by certifying more farmers. The deal is the second investment for The Yield Uganda Investment Fund, a €12 million agribusiness fund that was set up in 2017.
Three of last week's transactions were venture capital deals. Of the three, Careem's was the largest. The app-based car service, which is used in over 120 cities and towns from Morocco to Pakistan, has raised a significant chunk of its latest round from existing investors. Between them, they've provided $200 million of the $500 million or so the firm is targeting for its Series F round. The capital will be used to support the company's ongoing explosive growth.
Flutterwave announced it had completed its Series A Extension round last week, bringing the total raised to date to over $20 million. The payments infrastructure provider, which had raised over $10 million from a group of investors for its Series A last year, has snagged additional investments from Mastercard, CRE Ventures, Fintech Collective, 4DX Ventures, and Raba Capital, among others.
HAVAÍC is making an investment in Instant Property Rentals Holdings, an online commercial property sales and rental marketplace. The investment management and advisory firm has invested an initial, undisclosed amount of capital in exchange for a 10% stake, and has provided for an additional allocation of capital on which Instant Property retains an option to call. If the option is exercised, HAVAÍC's stake would rise to 17%.
In the only bit of fundraising news last week, AfricInvest announced the second close for its North African Fund, Maghreb Private Equity IV. The private equity fund manager has now secured €172 million for the fund, from a group of LPs that included two first-time investors in AfricInvest’s funds - OeEB and a South African fund-of-funds.
The close takes the fund closer to its ultimate goal of €200 million. In fact, AfricInvest expects to hold a third close for the fund before the end of the year which will bring the target within reach. All good news for small and medium-sized companies in North Africa who are looking for growth capital.
Finally, it’s not often that we publish news about ourselves, but we’re very excited to announce a unique partnership with fellow B2B information provider Asoko Insight. The strategic content partnership between Africa Capital Digest and Asoko will define the next generation of Africa-focused private equity deal information available to the market.
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.
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