Vanguard - Foreign investors stake N412bn on 35 Nigerian startups

In a seeming vote of confidence in the entrepreneurial capacity of Nigerians, foreign investors and a few local ones have staked $992 million (about N412 billion) as direct investment in 35 Nigerian-owned startups between January and October 2012.

Financial Vanguard  findings from the Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) and other sources, also show that the startups are mostly in the technology space and cut across payment platforms, education technology, agritech, e-commerce, IT, legal tech, digital freight, fashion, gifting, QSR, mobility, etc.

The development is perhaps a testament to the ranking by the Global Startup Ecosystem Index 2021 released by StartupBlink which showed that Lagos (Nigeria) has overtaken Nairobi (Kenya) to become Africa’s top startup ecosystem.

Justifying the investment, financiers note that African e-commerce is accelerating faster than could have been imagined a decade ago, projecting that the industry could reach $45 billion in the continent by 2025.

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