Madica, an investment program launched by US investor Flourish Ventures to support pre-seed startups in Africa, plans to invest in up to 10 companies by the end of the year, scaling up its efforts financing after closing three initial transactions.
Madica disclosed her plans to TechCrunch, indicating an acceleration of investments in the coming year, as she plans to create up to 30 startups by the end of her three-year program, which began in middle of last year, after launching at the end of 2022.
Announced today, the first beneficiaries of the program include Kola Market, a B2B platform founded by Marie-Reine Seshie to help SMEs increase their sales and simplify their business operations. Others are GoBEBA, a Kenyan on-demand home goods retailer founded by Lesley Mbogo and Peter Ndiang’ui, and Newform Foods (formerly Mzansi Meat), a South African cultured meat startup founded by Brett Thompson and Tasneem Karodia .
Others are expected to join the program, as Madica explores potential deals in emerging markets such as Tunisia, Morocco, Uganda, DRC, Rwanda and Ethiopia. This is in line with its plan to reach startups across diverse industries and markets, as well as those led by underrepresented and underfunded founders. Madica is looking beyond fintech, the most funded sector in Africa, and is also keen to support startups led by female founders (or where at least one founder is female), a demographic that continues to receive meager funding. venture capital financing.
“I believe that with the number of challenges that exist across the continent, it is the entrepreneurs in these markets who understand the context and have lived experiences around these issues who are best placed to solve these challenges. The aim of the Madica program is to prove and show that it is possible to find founders who are creating good companies but who do not fit the usual homogenous group,” said Emmanuel Adegboye, director of Madica.
Madica invests upfront, up to $200,000, once a business is accepted into the program, which lasts up to 18 months, and also involves personalized hands-on support and mentoring. It has set aside $6 million to invest in scalable technology companies and an equal amount to manage the first phase of the program, for which admission is rolling. The program does not have standard investment conditions, making each transaction unique.
“Our programming is both very personalized, but also structured in a certain way because founders enter the program at different times. The personalized part of the program is extremely essential because we want to understand what they need and how we can best support them,” Adegboye said.
“But we also recognize that at any given time, we will have at least a few companies that we will be working with as part of the program. So we have a few parts of the program that are very structured and that touch all of the companies within the portfolio.” , did he declare.
Adegboye hopes that as the program catalyzes pre-seed stage investments in different ecosystems across Africa, Madica will be able to attract more capital to the continent and eventually serve as a benchmark for global venture capital firms looking to expand their market operations.
“Depending on how the program evolves, we may strengthen it or open it up to other partners to join us and accelerate this mission.”
techcrunch
