The Africa Finance Corporation (AFC), a multilateral institution traditionally known for financing roads, ports, and heavy industry, is making a major pivot into the continent’s venture capital ecosystem.
On Monday, the AFC announced a $100m commitment to back Africa-focused technology fund managers. The move is designed to address a persistent vulnerability in the African tech ecosystem: a heavy reliance on foreign capital and a stark lack of local institutional investors on startup cap tables.
Despite African startups raising $3.1bn in 2025, the vast majority of that venture funding flowed from international sources. By deploying capital as a limited partner (LP), particularly into African-owned fund managers, the AFC aims to deepen local ownership and catalyze further participation from regional pension funds, insurers, and development finance institutions.
“Across the continent, young Africans are not waiting for the digital economy to arrive; they are seizing the moment,” said Samaila Zubairu, President and CEO of the AFC. “Digital infrastructure is now as fundamental to Africa’s transformation as roads, rail, ports, and power — enabling productivity, payments, logistics, services, data, and cross-border trade.”
The first tranche: Future Africa and Lightrock
To cover the full spectrum of the innovation lifecycle, the AFC has directed its initial anchor commitments to two prominent ecosystem players: Future Africa and Lightrock.
Future Africa’s Fund III will channel the AFC’s capital into early-stage, seed-level startups. The firm, founded by Iyin Aboyeji, focuses on founders building solutions for financial inclusion, digital infrastructure, and consumer technology.
Aboyeji views the AFC’s involvement as a critical signal to the broader African financial sector. “What young Africans need now are the skills, productive assets, and infrastructure to build and scale,” Aboyeji noted. “As our first multilateral development bank partner, AFC is sending a clear signal that digital is as fundamental to Africa’s transformation as agriculture and manufacturing. We trust that other development finance institutions, insurers, reinsurers, and pension funds will follow.”
At the other end of the pipeline, the AFC has backed Lightrock Africa Fund II to support growth-stage scaling. Lightrock, whose regional portfolio already includes heavyweights like Moniepoint, Lula, and M-KOPA, targets high-growth, tech-enabled businesses with proven pathways to profitability.
Pal Erik Sjatil, Managing Partner and CEO of Lightrock, stated that the partnership reflects a shared conviction in backing businesses with “strong fundamentals” that can deliver both financial returns and measurable social outcomes.
A maturing ecosystem
The AFC’s $100m mandate arrives at a critical juncture for African tech. The continent has produced nine unicorns to date, and select fund managers have reported returns of up to 128 times their initial invested capital. Furthermore, the region’s digital economy is projected to contribute over $700bn to Africa’s GDP by 2050, driven by a rapidly expanding, digitally native youth demographic.
However, the historical absence of local LPs has meant that when global macroeconomic conditions tighten — as seen during the recent global venture capital downturn — African startups are often disproportionately exposed to capital flight.
By utilizing its balance sheet, the AFC — which has invested over $19bn across 36 African countries since its inception in 2007 — is looking to stabilize that volatility. The institution confirmed it is actively evaluating a pipeline of additional Africa-focused funds spanning various strategies, with further LP commitments expected in the near term.