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FT ranking as Africa is Fastest Growing Companies 2023

After a recent period in which capital flows to emerging markets have slowed and start-up companies have been rattled by the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank, the FT/Statista 2023 annual ranking of Africa’s fastest-growing companies (below) casts its gaze back to encapsulate a time of corporate dynamism at what was the height of the pandemic.

The ranking, now in its second year, shows that companies in sectors including fintech, renewable energy, #healthcare, #commodities and #agriculture were managing to grow their businesses while much of the world shut down.

As in the ranking’s inaugural year, Covid appears to have accelerated the move online, with companies providing digital services in finance, payments, #trade facilitation and healthcare all making headway.

It also seems to have been the time in which Silicon Valley investors, as well as those in #Asia and #Europe, discovered potential in the African start-up scene, particularly in the tech hubs of #Lagos, #CapeTown, #Johannesburg, #Nairobi and #Cairo.

“A​​ lot of my friends . . . in Silicon Valley were getting FOMO [fear of missing out] about #Africa,” says Steve Beck, co-founder of Novastar Ventures, a Nairobi-based venture capital firm. “They were starting to put money to work on the continent, flying in and out and pushing up valuations.”

Figures from #SanFrancisco-based tech and digital investment platform Partech, Beck notes, show that #Africantech start-ups raised $5.2bn in 2021, three times more than the previous year. Valuations, however, have come under pressure in recent months.

Two Nigerian companies top the latest list of the continent’s fastest growing companies. #Abuja-based Afex Commodities Exchange, which provides brokerage and trade finance services for commodities such as #maize, #sorghum, #cocoa and #rice, is in first position, with a compound annual growth rate over three years of more than 500 per cent.

Moniepoint, a Lagos-based company that offers banking for small businesses, rates second. Venture capital group Novastar was an early funder.

Third is #Kenya’s Wasoko, which headed the list in the previous year. Headquartered in Nairobi, the ecommerce company helps small traders access inventory through more efficient supply chains in seven African countries.

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