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IFC, a member of the World Bank Group, today, announced an investment in the Savannah Fund, a leading technology seed fund in Africa, to increase lending to start-ups across sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The investment is aimed at supporting women entrepreneurs and disruptive companies in high-growth sectors.
 
IFC led the fund's first close, investing $3 million in the $25 million fundraising. The Women's Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative, or We-Fi, a partnership housed in the World Bank Group, invested $500,000.00. This is Savannah Fund's second seed fund.
 
The fund will provide early-stage funding to start-ups in Kenya, Nigeria, and South Africa, with an eye on expansion to Rwanda, Ethiopia, and Uganda in East Africa, as well as Cote d'Ivoire and Ghana in West Africa. The fund will invest in companies that support development at the bottom of the pyramid in sectors including fintech, education, logistics and e-commerce, healthcare, and agtech (agricultural technology).
 
"Savannah Fund II will continue its long-term mission to partner with ambitious founders building start-ups that will scale across Africa,” said Mbwana Alliy, Savannah Fund's Managing Partner. “We're especially bullish on start-ups that have the potential to scale beyond the continent and that can expand into Silicon Valley and emerging markets like South East Asia, Central and Eastern Europe and Latin America.

Alliy said that Entrepreneurs in Residence, especially female founders, are a key part of Savannah Fund's investment strategy.

Savannah Fund is one of the earliest SSA-focused tech venture capital firms, starting its investment activities in 2012 when it launched its first accelerator program in Kenya. In 2016, it transitioned to focus on early-stage start-up investments. To date, it has invested in 31 companies across seven countries on the continent.
 
"Early-stage funding is vital to enable more of Africa's emerging and growing tech founders to grow their businesses and fuel the transformation of Africa's Internet economy,” said Kevin Njiraini, IFC's Regional Director for Southern Africa and Nigeria. “By partnering with Savannah Fund, we can help more entrepreneurs to access funding."

Africa's digital economy could be worth $180 billion by 2025, and start-ups are a critical piece of this growth, IFC said in a statement it sent to Financial Nigeria today. It added that venture capital investments in start-ups in Africa in 2020 totalled around $1.4 billion.