When Karim Jouini and his co-founder Jihed Othmani sold their expense management platform, Expensya, to Swedish fintech Medius in 2023 for over $100 million, it marked one of the most significant exits for an African-founded tech company. But rather than stepping back, Jouini, now 39, has doubled down on investing in the next generation of startups while launching a new venture of his own.
Ranked fourth in France’s 2025 list of most influential business angels by Angelsquare and Challenges, Jouini has deployed €2.5 million across 26 startups, primarily in SaaS and impact-driven businesses. His approach is methodical: tickets between €50,000 and €100,000, targeting pre-seed and seed stages where his operational expertise — honed through Expensya’s scaling and exit — can make a tangible difference.
Karim Jouini’s investment portfolio reflects his belief in backing strong teams tackling large markets, with stakes in a diverse range of startups across sectors and geographies. His holdings include HR platform KlaraHR; clean energy innovator Lumiwave; Senegalese fintech LafricaMobile; public speaking coach Xgol; consent management solution Axeptio; deep health tech firm Knowlepsy; supply chain tracker TraceForGood; Tunisian collaboration tool Cynioa; Tunisian fintech Flouci; organic marketplace Bene Bono; Tunisian e-commerce platform Dabchy; and immersive training provider Uptale. This carefully curated selection demonstrates Jouini’s focus on scalable SaaS solutions and impact-driven businesses, united by their potential to transform industries through technology. His criteria are straightforward but exacting.
“Talent and innovation can come from anywhere,” Jouini told Launch Base Africa in an interview. “But the team is the most critical factor — skills, cohesion, values. Be a great person, investors like to work with great people. A great team in a large market will always find a way to succeed.”
Despite fielding a high volume of pitches, he remains open to new deals, though he admits to being “very selective.” His advice to founders is equally direct: “Be ambitious. Go after large markets. And don’t forget — this is hard work, so you’d better enjoy it.”
Expensya’s journey — from Tunisian roots to serving 6,000 businesses across 100 countries — is a case study in scaling a fintech with AI and mobile-first design. Its $20 million Series B in 2021 set the stage for the Medius acquisition, which included a $10 million payout for the company’s 110 Tunisian employees.
Post-exit, Jouini and Othmani wasted little time. By February 2025, they unveiled Thunder Code, an AI-powered platform aiming to slash software testing time by 90%. The startup targets a pain point Jouini knows well: “Even the best products sink resources into QA. We’re making it faster and accessible to non-technical teams.”
Thunder Code’s AI automates test generation, bug tracking, and even documentation — a bold bet in a competitive DevOps tools market.
Targeting product owners, project managers, QA experts, and delivery managers, the startup integrates seamlessly with popular development tools like Jira, Azure DevOps, and CI/CD pipelines. “Our goal is to simplify testing for everyone, which results in happier users,” says Othmani, CTO of Thunder Code.
Jouini’s dual role as founder and investor requires discipline. His warning to other entrepreneur-angels is pragmatic: “Focus is key. Don’t burn too much time on investments at the expense of your own company.”
Yet his track record suggests he’s found equilibrium. With Thunder Code’s launch and a growing portfolio, Jouini embodies a new wave of African tech leaders reinvesting their exits into ecosystems beyond Silicon Valley. His mantra — “large markets, great teams” — may lack flash, but in an era of frothy valuations, that clarity might be his edge.