Climate Investment Boost: US VP commits $7bn for Africa's climate projects

US VP announces over $7bn to fund climate projects in Africa

Highlights

• In response to Vice President Kamala Harris’s call for the private sector to promote and enhance climate resilience, adaptation, and mitigation across Africa, the private sector made over $7 billion in new commitments. 
• The US Government also announced new federal funding and initiatives to expand access to climate information services and enhance climate resilience and adaptation. 
• These are expected to generate significant economic benefits while addressing African nations’ pressing needs resulting from the climate crisis, including food security challenges, by helping to lift over 116 million farmers and promote climate-smart agriculture.

Source: White House

Our Takeaway

Climate change affects Africa more than other continents but at the same time, nowhere promises bigger opportunities than in Africa. The continent offers a massive investment opportunity given the need to reinvent all sectors, and we’re already seeing new value chains and business models created – from sustainable agribusiness to renewable energy, driven by a young and rapidly-growing population increasingly tackling big challenges and creating new markets. These present an ever-increasing pipeline of climate-related investment opportunities, hence the massive $7 billion commitment comes as little surprise.

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Camel Ventures launches $16m fund to back fintech in Egypt

Highlights

• Egypt-based Camel Ventures has launched a $16 million VC investment vehicle “Camel Ventures for Investment I (CVI)”.
• The new VC fund will focus on supporting Egypt’s fintech startup ecosystem, by providing them with both equity investments for early-stage startups, as well as venture debt for later-stage startups.
• CVI has already made ten investments in various sectors across Egypt, including Khazenly, Pharmacy Marts, and klickit.

Source: Wamda

Our Takeaway

In Egypt, only 33% of people have a bank account, according to the most recent World Bank data while 50% of its 100 million people actively use smartphones. Also, the North African country boasts a young and tech-savvy population with 61% below 30. Expanding access to financial services through digital channels is thus an attractive market opportunity, and startups leading such efforts stand to gain significantly from increasing amounts of venture capital available in the country, which has grown more than 10-fold since 2016 and has placed Egypt as one of Africa’s leading countries by tech venture funding.

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Troop raises $11m for South African, global expansion

Highlights

• Troop, a developer of corporate meeting technology and services secured $11 million in Series B funding to expand its presence in South Africa and globally.
• Its technology platform helps companies plan, book, expense, and manage logistics for in-person meetings, addressing the increased demand for group meetings due to the shift towards a distributed team environment.
• The company, whose customer base ranges from start-ups to well-established global enterprises, plans to double its current employee base in South Africa in 2023 and build a team of 170 people globally by 2025.

Source: Ventureburn

Our Takeaway

In Africa, startups digitizing the administrative stack for enterprise customers, such as Troop,  have a big market opportunity considering the growing appetite for enterprise software solutions among medium-to-large organizations on the continent. The Middle East and Africa’s cloud computing industry is expected to grow to $31.4 billion by 2026, from $14.2 billion in 2021, as more organizations digitize their operations. This opportunity has also pulled big operators like Microsoft, Google, Huawei, Equinix Inc, and Teraco, with huge investments being poured into data centers and cloud infrastructure on the continent.