Platform Capital, a top investment and advisory service provider to global businesses, through its subsidiary – Unicorn Group has launched the ‘Africa Walk’ to change misconceptions about Africa and help foreign investors better understand the continent’s business landscape.
The initiative themed ‘Africa Walk Unicorn Day’ attracted some foreign investors and companies from the United States and Latin America looking at investing in Africa and planning to expand their operations into markets across the continent.
Speaking during the Africa Walk Unicorn Day exhibition, Ponmile Osibo, partner, Platform Capital said that despite the opportunities across sectors on the African continent, there is a huge misconception about its narrative.
According to him, the Africa Walk initiative was launched to demystify Africa to international investors, by inviting them to come and see Africa for themselves, its culture, and opportunities from their perspective without not only relying on what they hear.
“We wanted to change the misconception about the reality of Africa,” he said.
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“We wanted to create an initiative and environment where we demystify Africa, where we would help investors understand the continent through our eyes the way that we see Africa,” Osibo said.
He added that the visits by foreign investors will provide clarity to them and help them understand that Africa is like other parts of the world.
He stated that the initiative which kick-started in Nigeria and Kenya, will be done annually, and different investors will be brought in to visit two countries on the continent yearly.
“The initiative is new and as we continue to bring in investors to visit different Africa countries yearly, within the next 25 to 30 years we would have taken different investors all across every country on the continent,” he said.
Speaking on the economic impact of the initiative, he said the initiative will help drive foreign direct investment, generate more jobs for the continent’s economy and drive economic growth.
According to him, five foreign investors and three companies from the United States and Latin America are already in Nigeria and would be visiting Kenya under the Africa Walk initiative.
Also speaking, Marlon Nichols, managing partner, MaC Venture Capital – a seed-stage venture capital firm that invests in technology start-ups leveraging shifts in cultural trends and behaviours said that his organisation has been looking at investing in Nigeria owing to its large and young population.
Similarly, Roman Weishaupl, founder and VP of product, SafeRoom – a SaaS platform that provides secure messaging for businesses, said it is partnering with Platform Capital to enter into the Nigerian market.
Weishaupl stated that there are enormous opportunities in Nigeria and that the opportunities are growing very fast.
According to him, despite the challenges that limit productivity on the continent, its opportunities still far outweigh its challenges.
“We believe that we have gotten strong partners and together we would address the issues as they come.”
Some of the investors and companies that visited Nigeria are; SoftBank represented by Dami Osunsanya; Angel Venture represented by Henan Fernandez and Camilo Kejner; View Accelerator represented by Alejandro Cortes Meza; GE Capital represented by Seyi Akinwale and MaC Venture Capital represented by Marlon Nichols.
Others are Trident Capital represented by Eric Taylor; Strap Technologies represented by Diego Roel; Solo Funds represented by Rooney Williams and Travis Holloway and SafeRoom represented by Bianca Loew and Roman Weishaupl.
