The collapse of high-profile foreign-led startups across Africa — from Kenya’s Kune Foods to Copia Global, Uganda’s SolarNow and France’s City Taps — has forced investors to rethink the kind of foreign entrepreneurs they are willing to back.

While foreign founders once attracted capital by transplanting Silicon Valley or European playbooks, 2025 data suggests a shift: investors are now more selective, backing foreign founders only when they demonstrate deep African experience, technical expertise, or strong partnerships with local co-founders.

Shifting Attitudes: From Parachute Founders to Embedded Operators

The early 2020s saw a series of costly failures. Players like Kenya’s Kune shut down within months, fintech clones mushroomed and fizzled in Nigeria, and imported “copy-paste” models failed to take hold. The perception that some foreign founders arrived with little knowledge of African realities has hardened investor caution.

Now, the pattern looks different. According to data analyzed by Launch Base Africa, foreigners are still present in Africa’s startup scene, but the profile has changed. Instead of parachuting in with little local grounding, successful foreign founders today tend to have extensive professional exposure to African markets or share equity with strong local co-founders.

Consider Kopa (Ghana), founded by US entrepreneur Erik Nygard, who previously exited Limejump, a UK-based clean energy startup acquired by Shell. His track record in energy innovation, combined with local operations in Ghana, has helped attract $8.1m from investors including E3 Capital (Kenya), Injaro (Ghana), and the Shell Foundation (UK). Investors say such profiles — repeat founders with proven exits who embed operations in African markets — are now more trusted than parachute CEOs.

Three Archetypes of Foreign Founders That Investors Still Trust

From recent funding rounds, three categories of seemingly “acceptable” foreign founders stand out:

1. Ex-Multinational or Consulting Operators with African Exposure
 Examples include Yi Li (FarmWorks, Chinese; ex-McKinsey Africa) and Kaganoi (Peach Cars, Japanese; ex-Safeboda). These founders often cut their teeth in supply chains, infrastructure, or financial services on the continent, making them more credible to investors.

2. Development and DFI Alumni
Peter Scott (BURN Manufacturing, British; ex-GIZ) and Martin Freimüller (Octavia Carbon, German; ex-Dalberg) illustrate another path: foreigners transitioning from development work into commercially viable impact ventures. This appeals to DFIs and impact-driven investors such as BII, Norfund and EDFI.

3. Serial Entrepreneurs with Africa Track Records
Josh Sandler (Lori Systems, US) and Emilian Popa (Ilara Health, Romanian; ex-Rocket Internet) , and Kopa’s Erik Nygard represent founders who either exited or failed in prior ventures but remained engaged in the ecosystem. Investors appear willing to give such founders second chances if they bring networks and lessons learned.

Investor Patterns: Who Backs Whom

The funding landscape reflects these preferences:

• Local and regional funds such as Future Africa, Ventures Platform, DOB Equity and Launch Africa increasingly back mixed teams, where foreigners co-found alongside Africans. Ghana’s Liquify, co-founded by a Ukrainian and a Ghanaian, fits this trend.
• Impact and DFI investors — including BII, Norfund, IFC and Shell Foundation — continue to favour foreign founders with development or climate backgrounds, particularly in clean energy and healthtech.
• Global VCs like QED, Flourish and YC remain fintech-focused but generally prefer African or African diaspora teams. Foreigners are considered only if paired with strong local counterparts.

Sectors Where Foreign Founders Still Hold Sway

Despite the caution, foreign founders remain dominant in certain capital-intensive or technical sectors:

• Climate tech and clean energy: Startups such as Octavia Carbon, BURN Manufacturing and Ghana’s Kopa are largely foreign-led, often by engineers or climate-finance experts. Kopa, founded by US entrepreneur Erik Nygard, raised $8.1m from E3 Capital, Injaro and Shell Foundation.
• Logistics and mobility: Companies like Peach Cars and Safeboda spinouts still rely on founders with global supply chain or consulting backgrounds.
• Healthtech: Foreign or mixed teams remain common, leveraging connections to pharma, medtech and academia — as seen with Ilara Health and Ivory Coast’s Meditect.

In contrast, fintech, proptech and commerce — where previous foreign-led ventures failed — are now led overwhelmingly by African founders.

Geography Matters

Attitudes toward foreign founders also differ by region:

• Kenya and Nigeria: the most competitive markets, where foreigners must either bring rare technical expertise or co-found with locals.
• North Africa: foreign involvement is more limited, though accelerators and corporates occasionally open doors, as with Morocco’s Toum AI.
• Francophone West Africa: remains more open to foreign-led startups, particularly American and French founders, who continue to attract large global VC rounds (e.g. Wave in Senegal; Meditect, etc.).

The Rise of the Embedded Foreign Founder

After a decade of high-profile failures, investors across Africa are recalibrating. The new acceptable foreign founder is no longer the outsider parachuting in with a Silicon Valley template. Instead, they are:

• Experienced in African markets or multinational operations.
• Often paired with African co-founders.
• Concentrated in technically demanding sectors like climate, energy and health.

For fintech, commerce and other mass-market plays, the baton has clearly passed to local entrepreneurs.

In effect, African investors are professionalising their expectations. Rather than betting on outsiders, they now demand embedded expertise — foreign founders who are not just in Africa, but of it.