African tech start-ups to see $15bn fund flow by 2025

AN ESTIMATE OF BE TWEEN $10 BILLION AND $15 BILLION HAS BEEN GIVEN as the amount of money that the African tech start-up ecosystem is likely to attract this year.

The amount is more than double the $4.9 billion that came into the ecosystem in 2021.

Different African business leaders, providing their forecasts for the year, said they see a surge in spending on tech start-ups as foreign direct investment and improved internet connectivity helps establish the continent as a tech superpower, the new research for blockchain-based mobile network operator World Mobile shows.

For instance, more than half or 54 percent of African senior executives expect spending on tech startups on the continent will more than double by 2025 to $10 billion, while around one in six or 16 percent believe more than $15 billion will be raised.

The study was carried out with African business leaders from companies with total annual revenues of more than $6.75 billion identified foreign direct investment and improving internet connectivity as the key drivers for the expansion.

It further revealed that around three-quarters or 75 percent believe the investment will come from Western countries while 66 percent believe China will be a major source of investment. Nearly six out of 10 or 57 percent believe dramatic improvements in internet connectivity will be the main support for expansion as it drives education, healthcare, and business.

The research among senior executives at companies with average annual revenues of $70 million based in Tanzania, Angola, Botswana, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Ghana, Nigeria, and South Africa found nearly half or 45 percent believe Africa will be a tech superpower within 10 years.

They point to the development of Africa’s tech ecosystem – nearly 90 percent of those interviewed expect it to grow by at least half its current size in the next three years with 15 percent expecting it to double in size during that period.

That in turn will expand Africa’s role in supplying technology to the rest of the world – around 60 percent of executives expect that to grow in the next five years with one in 10 predicting dramatic expansion.