The Nation Newspaper

Tag: Start-ups in Nigeria

  • Start-ups in Nigeria, others raise over $442m

    Start-ups in Nigeria, others raise over $442m

    Start-ups in Nigeria and other African countries have raised over $442million in funding in October (exc. exits), the second-best month this year, behind July. 76 per cent of the total ($334million) was raised as equity, making it the best performing month in terms of equity funding in 2025 so far.

    The two largest deals came from Spiro who raised $100million, the largest-ever investment in an e-mobility start-up on the continent, and Moniepoint which topped up their latest mega-round with an extra $90million. Tagaddod, Ctrack, and Mawingu all also raised $20million or more in equity, according to data compiled by an organization that tracks and analyzes start-up funding activity across the African continent, Africa: The Big Deal.

    The rest is almost exclusively debt – in line with the overall trend, including two large bond issuances: $71million by MNT-Halan and $23million by valU. Overall, 53 ventures raised at least $100k last month, which is above average if compared with the few months.

    “The good news is that – as we covered in our previous post – it also means that things are looking up for the ecosystem, with all key growth indicators green and double-digit growth (almost) across the board.

    Indeed, in 2025 so far start-ups in Africa have already raised $2.65 billion in total, which represents +56 per cent growth if we compare to the same period last year. It is also higher than the comparable period in 2023.

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    “If we focus exclusively on equity, we see growth once again: +31per cent YoY, and virtually the same amount as Jan-Oct 2023. Same story when it comes to the number of ventures who have raised at least $1million since the beginning of the year (179, +13 per cent YoY), which is both higher than the same period in 2024 (159) and in 2023 (178). Hopefully the end of 2025 can match the strong closing of 2024 when start-ups had raised $540million in November-December.

    “If we look at the past 12 months (Nov 24 – Oct 25), the story is equally encouraging: $3.2 billion were raised over that period (+50per cent YoY), including $1.9 billion in equity (+38per cent YoY); 207 ventures (+8per cent YoY) raised at least $1million over the period. While the performance over the next couple of months will determine how well the ecosystem does in 2025 overall, and whether the upward trend gets confirmed, there is definitely room for optimism,” the organisation said.

  • Start-ups in Nigeria, others raise $460m in Q1

    Start-ups in Nigeria, others raise $460m in Q1

    Start-ups in Nigeria, Kenya and others raised $460million in the first quarter (Q1) of this year through $100k+ deals (exc. exits), which is actually not much below the Q1 2024 number ($486million -five per cent YoY), according to new report.

    The report, entitled: Africa: The Big Deal, noted that Q1 2024 already wasn’t a particularly good quarter while Q1 2025 is the second-lowest quarter in terms of start-up funding since late 2020. Things are looking more positive if focus is put on the number of start-ups that announced at least $1million of funding in Q1: with 52, this is aligned with the 2023-2024 average.

    According to the report,  the ecosystem started the year on a high, with close to $300million raised by start-ups in January.

     February wasn’t as good ($119million), yet we still found reasons to be optimistic. The performance in March was poor in comparison though, as only $50m in funding were announced, one of the lowest monthly tallies since late 2020. That said, the number of start-ups announcing funding was on par with previous months; the issue is that there was no deals over $10million announced.

    Unsurprisingly, 83per cent of the funding went to the Big Four with Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa attracting roughly $100million in funding each (24per cent, 24per cent and 22per cent of the total respectively), followed by Egypt ($61million, 14per cent). Togo completed the top five, thanks to Gozem’s $30million Series B funding round.

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    Almost half of the funding (46per cent) was raised by fintech start-ups ($53million for LemFi, $38million for Naked etc.), followed as usual by energy (18per cent) and logistics & transportation (10per cent).

    Just over two per cent of the funding was raised by female CEOs ($10million), with the largest such round being a $6.2million grant to South African biotech African Biologics. If grants were deducted from the total, the share of funding raised by female CEOs in Q1 2025 would fall to 0.7per cent. At the end of the day, 79per cent of the funding went to either solo male founders (11per cent) or male-only founding teams (67per cent).

    Diverse founding teams attracted 20per cent of the total – which isn’t great, but is actually not a bad performance compared to previous quarters. A mere one per cent was invested in solo female founders or female-only founding teams.