FUNDING | African Startups Raise Over $600 Million in Q3 2024, Best Quarter of the Year So Far

African startups raised $636 million in funding in Q3 2024, more than twice as much as in Q2 2024, according to a new report by Africa: the Big Deal.

According to the report, 2 deals:

• d.light’s $176 million ‘securitisation multi-currency facility’ and
• MNT-Halan’s $157.5 million funding round

represented more than half of the amount raised during the period.

🇪🇬FUNDING | Egyptian Fintech Unicorn, MNT-Halan, Raises a Further $157 Million After Achieving Over 20x Customer Growth

The company, which achieved unicorn status in 2023 after attracting $400 million in the largest funding round in Egypt and the Middle East that year, has… pic.twitter.com/DZrdLyMxLw

— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) July 25, 2024

Overall, 44 start-ups raised $1 million or more during the period, better than Q2 2024, but lower than the 2023 quarterly average for instance (55/quarter).

Of the $636 million that were raised in Q3 2024, through $100k+ deals on the continent:

• 62% (almost $400 million) were raised in the form of equity,
• a little over a third (35%) in debt, and
• the rest (2.5%) in grant funding

Fintech ($363 million, 57%) and Energy ($199 million, 31%) alone attracted almost 9 out of every $10 invested in start-ups in Africa.

🌍 FUNDING | African Climate Tech Startups Captured 45% of the Total Funding, Surpassing Fintech, in H1 2024

So far in 2024, climate tech investments in Africa have already overtaken fintech.

Key areas of investment include logistics and transport which received $215 million,… pic.twitter.com/SOZwHp1WrZ

— BitKE (@BitcoinKE) September 6, 2024

“The numbers are highly skewed by the d.light deal for Energy and the MNT-Halan’s $157.5m raise for Fintech (though five other fintech ventures raised $20m or more in Q3: Nala, FlapKap, Fido, valU and Paymob).”

– Africa: The Big Deal

 

Again, as a result of the quarter’s 2 mega deals:

• Egypt ($272 million, 43%) topped the charts, followed by
• Kenya ($201 million, 32%),

which also means that three quarters of the funding raised in Africa in Q3 2024 went to these two markets alone, said the report.

Four other markets attracted $10 million of more in funding during the period:

•  Tanzania ($43 million)
•  South Africa ($40 million)
•  Ghana ($35 million)
• Nigeria ($26 million)

Ten additional countries attracted at least one $100k+ deal while 38 markets registered no significant start-up funding activity during the period.

Since the beginning of the year, startups have raised a combined $1.4 billion, which is 38% less funding than they had at the same time last year.

Kenya ($437 million, 31%) and Egypt ($373 million, 27%) come out on top again with a combined 58% of all the funding raised on the continent in 2024 so far.

Nigeria’s share (15%, $218 million) is comparable to what it was last year (14%).

 

“With 9% ($125 million) of the funding raised in 2024 so far, South Africa is at the moment recording its worst performance since 2019 in terms of its share of continental funding (6%), much below its average share in the past few years (18% between 2020 and 2023),” said the report.

 

So far in 2024, only 18% of the funding has gone to the ‘rest of Africa’ with 23 markets recording at least one $100k+ deal since January 1 2024.

 

 

 

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