The 5 most popular stories on Africa Private Equity News this week
Here are summaries of the five most widely read stories this week on Africa Private Equity News.
1. Ethos leads investment in Grit’s pan-African real estate business
Ethos Mezzanine Partners, one of the oldest dedicated specialist mezzanine credit funds in sub-Saharan Africa, announced its investment in Grit Real Estate Income Group Limited, a pan–African real estate business headquartered in Mauritius. The investment enables Grit to continue the roll-out of its pipeline, aimed at diversifying its investment in high-quality hard-currency earning African real estate assets with blue-chip tenants.
Ethos Mezzanine Partners led the transaction, structuring and arranging an investment of $31.5 million in Grit, and invited BluePeak Private Capital Fund to invest alongside it as a co-investor.
2. TLcom Capital secures first close of pan-African tech fund
TLcom, the Africa-focused venture capital firm, has announced a first close of $70 million for its $150 million Africa focused tech fund.
With a first close in line with the total size of its TIDE Africa Fund closed in 2020, TLcom’s second fund sees participation from Allianz, the world’s largest insurance company, through AfricaGrow, its joint venture with DEG Impact (German Investment Corporation), as well as a host of new and returning investors including Bertelsmann, King Philanthropies, the TLcom team and FBNQuest from the private sector, and major DFIs such as CDC Group (the UK’s development finance institution), IFC, Proparco and Swedfund. A second close of the fund is expected later in 2022.
3. DEG to invest $7.5m in Copia
Deutsche Investitions- und Entwicklungsgesellschaft (DEG), the German development finance institution and a subsidiary of KfW Group will invest $7.5 million equity in Copia Global Inc, an African mobile commerce start-up company that was founded in 2013.
Copia is the first mobile commerce platform built to serve middle to low-income African consumers, regardless of their access to technology or geographic location. By leveraging a network of agents and tech-enabled logistics operations, Copia addresses a high growth market that formal retail and e-commerce cannot reach. The company is expanding its product range towards offering embedded financial services products to its customers and agents.
4. South Africa: Kleoss Capital’s new fund reaches first close
Kleoss Capital has successfully reached first close for its Fund II at R600 million (about $39.5 million), more than half of the total targeted fund size of R1 billion (about $65.8 million).
Similar to Fund I; Fund II will be a South African mid-market growth strategy. Kleoss is firmly of the view that the South African mid-market sector remains a compelling investment opportunity.
5. Asaak raises $30m in funding; partners with Standard Bank
Asaak, an African asset financing startup, has secured $30 million of debt and equity capital in part by a successful pre-series A raise. Asaak is the first investment in Africa for many of its US-based VC backers, underscoring the opportunity for a platform like Asaak to address the continent’s asset financing gap.
In addition to the fundraise, Asaak also announced that it has partnered with Africa’s largest commercial bank by assets, Standard Bank, to both finance and provide insurance for a portfolio of Asaak’s motorcycle loans. The partnership extends beyond the financing, with Asaak and Standard Bank working closely together to co-create complementary and innovative products for its customers.
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